Townhall Review | Commentaries

The scathing report of decades of disgusting crimes and cover-up from the Catholic Church hierarchy has come to light because of the Pennsylvania Attorney General. The shocking report—coming as it does after at least two previous efforts at coming clean and reform that neither came clean nor reformed—has left tens of millions of Americans Catholics shell shocked.

They simply don’t know who or what to believe. 

Pope Francis made a terrible situation even worse by issuing what could only be labeled the “same old same old” by a pope who has proven stubbornly deaf and often appeared indifferent to the sexual abuse of minors across all continents and going as high as the College of Cardinals.  

It’s a moment of what intellectuals call “existential crisis” for the Church. It will never vanish, but church membership and finances could well collapse. Pope Francis seems wholly unaware of this urgent threat. 

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George Gilder is the economist and author who holds the distinction of being quoted by Ronald Reagan more than any other living author.

Gilder is out with a new book, and it’s a blockbuster. And what’s being “busted” is the Obama-era business model of centralized control of social media.

“Life After Google” makes the case that the old model is doomed. And it comes at just the right time. Conservatives are fed up with Google delisting conservative voices like Dennis Prager’s, Facebook labeling the Declaration of Independence hate speech and Twitter shadow-banning Republican officials.

According to Gilder, block chain technology, the tech behind the cyber currency Bitcoin, is the stone which will shatter these dominating hierarchies of wealth and power.

That will put the internet back into the hands of the people.

And that is a good thing.

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To forestall the so-called "blue wave."

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The urgent need for civic education in our schools.

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In middle school, I first heard the phrase that America had been blessed with “a government of laws and not of men.” That description, originating with John Adams, at first made no sense to me: men make the laws, and change them. Laws don’t draft themselves, or enforce themselves—ultimately, we rely on decent people to give life to the law and to uphold it.

Recently, however, I’ve gained new perspective on Adams’ famous distinction because of the toxic politics of the moment. Media irresponsibly emphasize personalities—and especially the polarizing personality of President Trump. It’s hard to compromise between love or loathing for any individual; and it’s vastly easier to find middle ground on that leader’s policies or programs.

In these polarizing times, all Americans would benefit from greater emphasis on policy, and less focus on personality.

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In recent years, Americans have watched as our “first freedom,” religious liberty, is now openly despised by many who push the new sexual revolution.

We’ve seen nuns forced to pay for contraceptives while bakers, wedding photographers and florists faced criminal and civil actions for living out their Christian convictions.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions recently announced a new “Religious Liberty Task Force” warning that some in our society are now openly targeting religious groups “by labeling them a ‘hate group.’

The outrage from the Left is extremely instructive: The Democratic National Committee charged Sessions of “shamefully doubling down on bigotry.” Planned Parenthood called the task force “another license to discriminate.” One liberal commentator said the DOJ is trying to create “a regressive Christian white ethnostate.”

No kidding.

It’s as if they were trying to make the Attorney General’s case for him.

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Anybody who’s paying attention to the news knows that Twitter’s leadership is politically biased. But you might not know that the social media giant has gone beyond censoring alleged extreme right wing users to “shadow-banning” mainstream GOP congressmen.

“Shadow-banning” is when an account and their tweets are hidden from others without the user being notified.

In a public statement, Twitter denied that they shadow-ban people—but they changed the definition of shadow-ban in order to do so. And then they undid the bans, which they denied ever having made in the first place.

Of course twitter has a 1st amendment right to ban whatever speech they want to.

But: If Twitter executives use corporate resources to push their own political hobbies, then they are misusing shareholder assets, and they should stop … now.

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Just last month, Vice President Michael Pence, speaking on behalf of the Trump administration, stared down the nation of Turkey. In 2016, an evangelical pastor ministering in Turkey was arrested by government authorities and imprisoned. After being held for more than a year Pastor Andrew Brunson was finally charged with “dividing and separating” Turkey. Or—as Vice President Pence said, for “simply spreading his Christian faith.”

The Vice President spoke boldly: “Release Pastor Brunson now, or be prepared to face the consequences…” and he went on from there.

It was tough language— and it was language the Trump administration followed through on just last week. It’s what the defense of religious liberty requires in these times. This is exactly the message the world needs to hear from the land of the free, and the home of the brave. 

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Economic growth has been significantly stronger than last year and has really spiked—up 4.1 percent in the last quarter.

Some say that the tax cuts had nothing to do with the growth spurt. But the fact that growth slowed  before the tax cut kicked in, and sped up after it kicked in shows that the tax cuts were the drivers.

In addition, a new report indicates that average Americans have gotten a 5.4 percent increase in disposable income. That’s partly because of the pay increase and partly because of the tax cut.

But it’s entirely good news.

When you consider the low unemployment numbers and the growth in capital spending, there’s substantive evidence that the decade of stagnation may be over.

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We are just under 100 days from the November 6 midterms, and Republicans are in much better shape than most prognosticators imagined.

The president’s brand of political hardball upsets many in the GOP, even unbalancing more than a few.

But his commitment to originalist judges and a sizable military rebuild are the two most consequential aspects of his tenure. The economy is cooking, with a promise of a long stretch of economic growth above 3 percent ahead.

Electing Democrats to a majority in the House or the Senate at the height of that party’s lurch left would be a disaster: Impeachment, demands for massive income tax hikes, while also throwing the military rebuild into reverse.

It’s critical for Republicans to unite solidly behind Republican candidates, yes: even if you loathe the president, vote Republican.

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