Planned Parenthood Tweets Opposition to ‘Tearing Apart Families’

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Planned Parenthood’s political action committee ironically condemned the Supreme Court’s 4-4 split on President Obama’s immigration executive order Thursday in a tweet saying the mega abortion provider opposes “tearing apart families.”

The Supreme Court tie has the effect of upholding a lower court which ruled Obama’s order freezing certain deportations was an illegal use of executive power. Planned Parenthood Action Fund, a sister organization to Planned Parenthood that focuses on political advocacy, was deeply distressed by the tie, declaring on Twitter that “human dignity has no borders.”

A few other Twitter users noted the statement’s irony, given Planned Parenthood’s status as America’s largest abortion provider. Some referenced the fact that many abortions specifically rely on a procedure in which a fetus is torn apart so that its pieces may be safely removed from the mother. Others observed that Planned Parenthood apparently does believe in borders for human dignity.

Planned Parenthood Action Fund also condemned the ruling in a statement on its website, where it continued to use rhetoric that could also be applied in an abortion context.

“It could … rip millions of families apart,” spokeswoman Daniela Ramirez said. (For more from the author of “Planned Parenthood Tweets Opposition to ‘Tearing Apart Families'” please click HERE)

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Pregnancy Center’s Pro-Life Message Will Not Be Silenced in Indiana

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An Indiana pregnancy center won a victory for the pro-life message Wednesday when the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the Fort Wayne city-bus system “unfairly censored” its pro-life ads.

LifeNews reports, that the Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented the pregnancy center—Women’s Health Link—celebrated the decision.

“A government shouldn’t be censoring ads from a group like Women’s Health Link when it is running nearly identical ads from other groups, such as The United Way. The 7th Circuit’s decision rightly understands that the First Amendment protects freedom of speech for all people, regardless of their political, moral, or religious views,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot, who argued before the 7th Circuit earlier this month. “The city of Fort Wayne’s bus system has a responsibility, like all other government entities, to ensure equal access to community advertising forums that it creates.”

Womens Health Link Ad

Conservative Review’s Nate Madden reported on ADF’s lawsuit earlier this June.

According to the complaint from ADF, Citilink — Fort Wayne’s bus system — ran afoul of the First Amendment in its dealings with Women’s Health Link when it refused to ruse a series of ads “due to Plaintiff’s life-affirming viewpoint regarding the promotion of public health, association with a pro-life group, and alleged discussion of ‘controversial issues’ on its website, which constitutes unlawful viewpoint discrimination.”

The 7th Circuit’s ruling overturned a previous ruling from the U.S. District Court that sided with Citilink.

According to the ADF, the decision recognized that Women’s Health Link’s ad “complies fully with the conditions set forth in Citilink’s rules,” and found that the ad “is a public service announcement that does not so much as hint at advocating or endorsing any political, moral, or religious position… Yet the district judge granted summary judgment in favor of Citilink. He shouldn’t have.”

Women’s Health Link provides pregnant women with alternatives to abortion through counseling and material support. (For more from the author of “Pregnancy Center’s Pro-Life Message Will Not Be Silenced in Indiana” please click HERE)

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Top Firm in Meltdown: Game Burns Jews in Ovens

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Without comment or explanation, an app-based “game” on Google Play that let users “live like a real Jew in the Auschwitz Concentration Camp” has been removed after it was widely condemned.

At United with Israel, Colette Avital of the Center of Organizations of Holocaust Survivors said, “We cannot understand how the top management of Google approved such a cynical game, turning the martyrdom of six million Jews into an object for amusement and enjoyment.”

The World Jewish Congress noted that the comment section attached to the app offering attracted anti-Semitic comments.

“One user expressed his enjoyment at playing the game and said the only problem was ‘that every 20 minutes I find the full oven and I have to come to remove ash’,” the report said.

And at Forward.com, Drew Gerber’s report noted that it wasn’t the first time Google Play has been caught with anti-Semitic products, having recently removed a “Google Chrome extension that modified webpages so the user could identify Jewish people and organizations.” (Read more from “Top Firm in Meltdown: Game Burns Jews in Ovens” please click HERE)

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Voters Oppose Obama’s Transgender Bathroom Mandate by Wide Margin: Poll

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A strong majority of voters disapprove of Barack Obama’s mandate that public schools and universities open their restrooms and private facilities to the opposite sex, according to a new poll.

Voters in the swing states of Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania told Quinnipiac University pollsters they disapproved of the Obama administration’s controversial federal guidance requiring public schools and universities to allow transgender students to use the restrooms, showers, and overnight accommodations of the opposite biological sex or lose federal funding.

Polls found respondents in those three states opposed the measure by an average of 14 percentage points.

In Ohio, 55 percent opposed the Obama administration policy, while 36 percent supported.

Florida voters opposed the measure 54-37. (Read more from “Voters Oppose Obama’s Transgender Bathroom Mandate by Wide Margin: Poll” HERE)

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California Judge Refuses to Throw out Lawsuit From Church Objecting to Paying for Abortions

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A federal district court judge in California is allowing a church’s lawsuit against the state over an abortion funding requirement to proceed. But that was only one of two decisions bearing on the case issued two days apart, and the other was not favorable to pro-life interests.

Skyline Wesleyan Church had filed a lawsuit against the state, asserting that a state agency’s new interpretation of California law would violate both federal and state law by requiring the church to provide insurance coverage for elective abortions. The California Department of Managed Healthcare responded by requesting the court dismiss the case, but Judge Marilyn Huff disagreed in an opinion issued on June 20.

In Skyline Wesleyan Church v. California Department of Managed Health Care, the CDMH claimed that abortion is a “basic right” and therefore all insurance plans had to include it. To do otherwise would constitute discrimination prohibited by the California Constitution. The church objected that the requirement violated its First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, as well as its rights under the California state constitution. The church also objected that the agency had not followed state law by issuing the order without required public notice and comment.

Planned Parenthood and the ACLU had aggressively sought the new interpretation, in response to Catholic universities in California dropping abortion coverage from their health insurance. According to Ned Dolejsi, executive director of the California Catholic Conference, said the the CDMH acted “t the behest of organizations such as the ACLU and Planned Parenthood,” which used their political power to coerce organizations they disagreed with.

In her decision, Huff granted part of the CDMH’s appeal, by rejecting the church’s claims that its Fourteenth Amendment rights had been violated, but let the rest stand. However, the church can reassert that claim by amending the argument and filing it again. The church has one month to respond and the CDMH thirty days after that to respond to the church.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorney Jeremiah Galus, who is representing the church, praised the decision. “Californians shouldn’t be forced to choose between following their deepest convictions and submitting to unlawful, unjust government mandates,” he said.

The California mandate leaves churches with no legal way at all to opt out of paying for abortions. The Department of Managed Health Care unconstitutionally forced abortion coverage into churches’ health insurance plans without their knowledge or approval, and the agency didn’t even follow the appropriate administrative procedures to institute this mandate. The court was right to deny the state’s attempt to escape accountability for its actions.

Win one, lose one

The news for organizations opposed to abortion and for religious liberty was only half-good, however. In 2014, seven California churches, along with the California Conference of Catholic Bishops and Loyola Marymount University, had challenged the agency’s interpretation by filing a complaint with the federal HHS Office of Civil Rights (OCR). The complaint alleged that the agency’s ruling violated the federal Weldon Amendment, an annual appropriations rider that prohibits discrimination against health care entities that refuse to provide coverage for abortion.

OCR dismissed the complaint on June 22, stating, “OCR found no violation of the Weldon Amendment and is closing this matter without further action.” Quoting Congressman Weldon himself at length, the agency’s head Jocelyn Samuels said the amendment applies to insurance companies, not to employers that have a moral objection to abortion.

The ACLU cheered the dismissal. The group’s legislative counsel said that the decision “affirms what has always been true, that safe and legal abortion is basic health care that all women should be able to access without interference. The religious beliefs of others must not be used to restrict women’s access to constitutionally protected care.”

In contrast, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) criticized the decision, noting that the Weldon Amendment has been renewed every year and signed by President Obama, but his administration “has again shown blatant disregard for the rule of law. This decision illustrates the far reaches of Obama’s radical pro-abortion ideology — forcing churches and communities of faith that have pro-life convictions to participate in and pay for a practice that dismembers and chemically poisons unborn children.”

Smith called Congress to “take this issue out of the hands of the Obama Administration by moving enforcement of current conscience protections to the courts. Congress needs to enact legislation so churches and other victims have a ‘private right of action’ so they can have their day in court.”

Casey Mattox, senior counsel for the Life Legal Defense Foundation, condemned the decision as cherrypicking. “The Obama Administration’s refusal to enforce this law continues its pattern of enforcing laws it wants to enforce, refusing to enforce others, and inventing new interpretations of others out of whole cloth.” (For more from the author of “California Judge Refuses to Throw out Lawsuit From Church Objecting to Paying for Abortions” please click HERE)

Watch a recent interview with the author below:

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The Hero of the Bible Is God — Not Flawed People

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As conservatives, we are trying to conserve that which is right, just, true, and noble about and for the human condition. Both for this and future generations.

Many of those things have their basis and/or inspiration in the Bible, which is evident in so many of our founding documents, traditions, and way of life. This is why I have no problem as a believer swearing an oath to uphold and defend the actual wording of the U.S. Constitution, because it was devised with my worldview in mind.

Unfortunately, in an election featuring two systemically flawed, damaged, and unrepentant people running for the highest office in all the land, there is a tendency — even among those who have proven before their virtue and worth — to try and rationalize choosing one of them to vote for. And this is done usually at the expense of what we’re supposed to be conserving.

For example, some Christian leaders — and these are real leaders, not fake ones for hire on the political hack payroll — are attempting to justify Donald Trump’s lifetime of debauchery and malfeasance. Like in the following tweet from James Hohmann, who is a national political reporter for the Washington Post:

I have an immense amount of respect for Franklin Graham, and his family’s legacy. Barely a day goes by that I don’t find something he says profound enough to re-tweet to my own followers. My home church is an affiliate of his Christmas Box charity program for children around the world. I acknowledge that in the Christian/media hierarchy he’s in the gated community and I live in the suburbs.

That being said, “God is not a respecter of persons.” So neither should we be. The truth here is I believe, with all due respect, that Franklin Graham is not rightly dividing the Word of God here. And in the interests of conservatism, we cannot allow a generation of Americans who already have no idea what their historical legacy is to be further led into moral pea soup. Where there is no clarity, only subjective opinions. Which is exactly how the progressives want it.

But if there’s anything the Bible provides it is clarity.

See, the Bible clarifies we live for God’s glory. Not Him for ours. That yes, as Franklin Graham points out all of the Bible’s significant figures other than Christ were flawed vessels. That’s because all of us other than Christ are flawed vessels.

This is why Christ came to Earth. He came to bridge the gap between our flaws and God’s holy perfection. He came to be our perfect vessel of atonement, resurrection, and redemption. That when we couldn’t get up to heaven, heaven came down to us.

However, we are not to look at the flawed vessels God still used to accomplish His plan and seek to emulate them. As if to say, “I’ll just go on being an unrepentant degenerate and God will bless me for it because He needs me.”

That is willful rebellion, not humble contrition.

Instead, we are to see these people and then realize that we, too, can be redeemed and used by God for mighty things if we seek Him and His ways. Not ours. That we are to look at them and see ourselves, yes, but not pridefully. Rather we are to see ourselves and not boast but be convicted that “all of have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” That’s why we all need a Savior.

Jacob, one of the great patriarchs of the faith, has a name that literally means “schemer” and that’s what he was. But nobody goes to the Church of Jacob today. We go to the Church of God, who still chose to use Jacob the Schemer for His glory. Not to mention, when the significant figures of the Bible committed these sins both they and those around them paid a terrible cost for it.

For instance:

Yes, Abraham defied God by sleeping with his servant out of wedlock to conceive a child. That child would go on to become Ishmael, which tradition teaches is the rival patriarch of Islam. As in the source of rivalry, warfare, and bloodshed with the Jews — who are descended from Abraham’s other son, Isaac — for centuries to the present day.

Yes, even Moses defied God as the leader of the Jewish people. He was banned from ever stepping foot in the Promised Land as a result.

Yes, David was an adulterer several times over. And it nearly cost him his crown, plunging his entire kingdom into civil war.

Yes, Paul was once a persecutor named Saul. But he suffered temporary blindness, and then lived a ministry where he himself was constantly persecuted or under the threat of it after his conversion. As were those who accompanied him on his travels. As Saul, Paul encouraged the mob to kill the first martyr, Stephen, and then was martyred for his faith, too.

I could continue, but by now you get the picture. God is a God of justice, so if we choose to sin we choose to suffer the consequences. That even applies to those called directly into leadership by God, who are held to the same standard as everyone else and not given preferential treatment. Fortunately, God offers to spare us eternal condemnation for those sins if we earnestly seek and ask His forgiveness. That is the Gospel message in a nutshell:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son. That whomsoever shall believe in him will not perish, but have eternal life. That God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that through him the world may be saved.

Therefore, the primary role of Christian leaders, according to the Bible, is to lead unrepentant sinners like Donald Trump (who openly admits he’s never asked God for forgiveness) to the Cross. Not the White House. For what good does it do a man to gain the whole world, but lose his eternal soul in the process? Did Jesus die for Trump to be president, or for Trump to be forgiven? Shouldn’t we, then, as his followers emphasize that which he gave his life for?

If we have come to a point as a culture that we’re no longer going to urge unrepentant sinners to be forgiven, as Franklin’s father Billy preached to the world over for decades, but instead cast our pearls unto swine by wish-casting them into powerful political offices, then the church is in no position to conserve American Exceptionalism for future generations.

For the church herself is responsible for losing it.

“Consider how far you have fallen. Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lamp stand from its place.”

Jesus Christ, Revelation 2:5

(For more from the author of “The Hero of the Bible Is God — Not Flawed People” please click HERE)

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Air Force Base Silences Veteran for Using the Word ‘God’ in a Retirement Speech

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Uniformed airmen forcibly removed an Air Force veteran from a military base because he invoked God in a speech for a retirement ceremony, according to the legal group that represents him.

They escorted Oscar Rodriguez Jr. from the “flag-folding” ceremony as the 33-year veteran began his remarks at Travis Air Force Base in California.

“It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life,” Rodriguez, who retired from the Air Force as a senior master sergeant, said in a June 20 press release prepared by his lawyers. He added:

I have given more than three decades of service to the military and made many sacrifices for my country. To have the Air Force assault me and drag me out of a retirement ceremony simply because my speech included the word ‘God’ is something I never expected from our military.

Rodriguez was set to deliver the flag-folding speech at Master Sgt. Charles “Chuck” Roberson’s retirement ceremony April 3 at Travis Air Force Base.

Roberson had heard Rodriguez give the speech at a friend’s retirement ceremony and invited Rodriguez to give the same speech for him according to First Liberty Institute, a legal organization that defends the religious freedom of Americans.

Rodriguez enlisted in the Air Force Army Reserve in 1980. He started out training as an avionic technician and later was promoted to section chief. He retired in 2013 as senior master sergeant.

His speech mentions God about six times, Mike Berry, senior counsel and director of military affairs at First Liberty Institute, told The Daily Signal.

“It is this one nation under God that we call, with honor, the United States of America,” a transcript of the speech says. “God bless our flag. God bless our troops. God bless America.”

Roberson’s unit commander at Travis Air Force Base tried to prevent Rodriguez from attending the ceremony, his lawyers say. They say the commander lacked the authority to prevent Rodriguez from attending, but then told Roberson that Rodriguez could not give the speech.

Roberson and Rodriguez tried to clear the speech through higher authorities at Travis, but did not receive a response, according to First Liberty Institute.

“Contrary to what the commanding officer here has told Chuck and Oscar, you can have religious speech in a retirement ceremony,” Berry told The Daily Signal, referring to Roberson and Rodriguez.

The ceremony initially went on as planned. When Rodriguez began his speech, though, uniformed personnel forcibly grabbed and removed him, Berry said.

First Liberty Institute issued a demand letter to military leaders, asking them to apologize to Rodriguez and hold responsible parties accountable for their actions.

“The United States military has no right to do this to a private citizen,” Berry said.

Saying the actions against Rodriguez are unlawful and violate the Constitution, Berry told The Daily Signal:

We’ve seen enough instances of religious hostility in our military now over the last several years, and it continues to get worse and worse every year … I really think Congress needs to step in now and begin mandating constitutional training for our military leaders so that they understand that just because they wear a uniform and just because they have a large amount of authority as a commanding officer in the military, it doesn’t give them carte blanche to break the law or to trample over the Constitution.

“Rodriguez ignored numerous requests to respect the Air Force prescribed ceremony and unfortunately was forcibly removed,” a Travis Air Force Base official said in a statement to FoxNews.com in April.

Mikey Weinstein, founder and president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, told The Daily Signal that the Air Force took the correct action by removing Rodriguez. Weinstein said it’s important to follow Defense Department directives, instructions, and regulations.

“The Air Force Instruction 1-1 Section 2.12 makes it very, very clear” that the commander is responsible for everything that happens on the base, Weinstein said.

Rodriguez’s rights are different on a military installation at an official ceremony than at a private, unofficial ceremony, he said.

“We feel the Air Force probably should have court-martialed [Roberson] here,” Weinstein said.

A Travis Air Force Base spokesman told The Daily Signal that there is a local investigation into the situation.

“The Secretary of the Air Force has directed the Air Force inspector general to conduct an independent investigation into events that took place April 3, 2016, at a retirement ceremony at Travis Air Force Base, California,” Capt. Brooke Brzozowske told The Daily Signal in an email.

Brzozowske added:

Regarding the Air Force policy on retirement ceremonies, Air Force personnel may use a flag-folding ceremony script that is religious for retirement ceremonies. Since retirement ceremonies are personal in nature, the script preference for a flag-folding ceremony is at the discretion of the individual being honored and represents the member’s views, not those of the Air Force. The Air Force places the highest value of the rights on its personnel in matters of religion and facilitates the free exercise of religion by its members.

(For more from the author of “Air Force Base Silences Veteran for Using the Word ‘God’ in a Retirement Speech” please click HERE)

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Kim Davis Faces Last Fight in Same-Sex Marriage Battle

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Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis is attempting to end her long legal battle for refusing to sign marriage licenses for same-sex couples.

Davis’ legal team filed a motion Tuesday requesting a federal appeals court dismiss the lawsuit against her after Kentucky passed a law to accommodate Davis and clerks like her. After the Supreme Court recognized same-sex marriage nationwide in 2015, Davis made headlines for refusing to issue marriage licenses. She was sued and jailed for five days for her refusal and became a national point of debate on the ongoing legal struggle to find the line between freedom of conscience and discrimination.

Davis was released from jail when other employees in the clerk’s office began issuing licenses. Her office continued issuing the licenses without her name.

In April, Republican Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin signed a bill that brings “statutory finality” to the long battle over marriage licenses in the state. The law, which takes effect July 14, changes marriage licenses so they do not include the county clerk’s name and allow people to check whether they are a bride, groom or spouse.

Because of this new law, Davis says the suit against her should be dismissed.

“Because Davis’ appeals are rendered moot by this recent legislative enactment before the merits of her appeals have been decided, this Court, in dismissing the appeals, should also follow its normal course of vacating the district court’s orders on appeal,” Davis’ motion reads.

It remains to be seen how the court will respond. A hearing is set for July.

“From the beginning, Kim Davis requested the very accommodation for her religious convictions that the Kentucky legislature passed and which Gov. Matt Bevin signed into law,” Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel, the group representing Davis, said in a statement. “The previous governor could have made the same accommodation but refused to do so. Instead, he was willing to violate deeply-held religious convictions about marriage in order to press his ideological agenda. Now that Kim Davis obtained the accommodation she has always requested, we notified the Court of Appeals that the case has become moot and no further legal proceedings are needed. We are very pleased with this outcome.” (For more from the author of “Kim Davis Faces Last Fight in Same-Sex Marriage Battle” please click HERE)

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Michael Jackson’s ‘Shocking’ Child Pornography Collection Detailed in 2003 Neverland Ranch Police Report

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A Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department police report taken from a 2003 search at Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch residence turned up a cache of photos of naked men and women, animal sex videos and child pornography, all allegedly used to seduce young boys.

Jackson’s alleged, never-before-seen, porn stockpile was the result of a search that was part of an ongoing child sex abuse investigation against the pop singer, according to Radar Online.

“The detectives’ report cites Michael even used sexy photos of his own nephews, who were in the band 3T, in their underwear to excite young boys.” a private investigator said, according to Radar.

At the behest of Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Detective Craig Bonner, an additional warrant was granted and investigators also searched a rented storage space. In it, police found audio and video tapes, photos, dairies, and several computer hard drives.

“The documents collected by the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department paint a dark and frightening picture of Jackson,” one anonymous investigator working on Jackson’s case told Radar. “The documents exposed Jackson as a manipulative, drug-and-sex-crazed predator who used blood, gore, sexually explicit images of animal sacrifice and perverse adult sex acts to bend children to his will.” (Read more from “Michael Jackson’s ‘Shocking’ Child Pornography Collection Detailed in 2003 Neverland Ranch Police Report” HERE)

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Secret Service Agent Book: Raging Hillary Clinton Threw Bible at Agent’s Colleague

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Hillary Clinton once threw a Bible at the back of a Secret Service agent’s head, part of a pattern of unhinged rage that the now-presumptive Democratic nominee exhibited, as exposed for the first time in former Secret Service agent Gary Byrne’s grueling insider account of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Byrne’s forthcoming book Crisis of Character—in which he details how the Clintons operated during his time in the U.S. Secret Service, where he protected the first couple for eight years in the White House in the 1990s. During three of those years, he was posted right outside the Oval Office. The book comes out next week.

“The First Lady had a different sort of liveliness,” Byrne writes in an excerpt obtained exclusively by Breitbart News. “She once threw a Bible at an agent on her detail, hitting him in the back of the head. He bluntly let her know it wasn’t acceptable. He told me that story himself.”

Byrne goes on to report that for Secret Service agents, being assigned to Hillary Clinton’s detail “was a form of punishment handed down by passive-aggressive middle management.” (Read more from “Secret Service Agent Book: Raging Hillary Clinton Threw Bible at Agent’s Colleague” please click HERE)

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