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Church vs. State: Catholic Bishops Vow to Defy Blue-state “Reveal-confessions” Law

By Selwyn Duke

“‘We must obey God rather than men.’” So said Seattle Archbishop Paul Etienne, quoting the Bible, while explaining why priests will go to prison before complying with a new Washington state law. The issue?

The law requires clergymen to report acts of child abuse revealed during Confession. The problem?

Among other things, Catholic Church Canon Law forbids a priest from breaking the “seal of Confession.” The penalty for doing so is excommunication, which a sincere priest would fear more than any worldly punishment. It is such a serious matter, too, because Confession is one of seven Sacraments in Catholic belief. And the Sacraments are believed to have been established by God. They are thus nonnegotiable.

The Autism Explosion: Is It Vaccines, Fluoride — or Modern Society?

By Selwyn Duke

Common sense is “that forgotten branch of psychology,” observed philosopher G.K. Chesterton in the early 1900s. One could wonder what he’d say today, with “psychology” — which means “study of the soul” — being both soulless and ubiquitous.

And it being so widespread is a reason, it’s said, that autism diagnoses are so common today. We’re more “aware” of the problem and “the screening is better” is the idea. But then there are other theories. Some have implicated vaccines in autism manifestation, while others have cited fluoride as a possible cause. For his part, HHS secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has vowed to investigate the matter and says that by “September, we will know what has caused the autism epidemic.”

But will we? What if the cause is cultural as much as, or more than, environmental (or genetic)? What if, as one writer put it Sunday, “society is the problem”?

Looking for Unicorns: The Search for a “Joe Rogan of the Left”

By Selwyn Duke

My, the worm truly has turned — at least halfway. It wasn’t that long ago, really, that conservatives lamented how “mainstream” media “controlled the narrative.” Back in 2011, in fact, Professor Tim Groseclose estimated that “media bias aids Democratic candidates by about 8 to 10 percentage points in a typical election.” Now, though, the erstwhile “mainstream” media isn’t so mainstream anymore. New media, epitomized by podcaster king Joe Rogan and English comedian Russel Brand, currently boast audiences dwarfing those of the alphabet network shows. So now the lament is different:

“The Right is controlling the narrative!” warn so many leftists.

But are they right? Perhaps even more significantly, are they right about what’s “right” (as opposed to left)?

Trump’s Congressional Address Polls Bigly While Dems Flail and Fail

Image created using AI.

By Selwyn Duke

Is it time to retire the donkey and make an angry old man waving a cane the Democratic Party’s new symbol? Such a display, of course, was precisely what got Representative Al Green (D-Texas) expelled from President Donald Trump’s address to Congress on Tuesday. It well reflects the Democrats’ general antics last night, too, behavior which went over like a lead balloon.

Meanwhile, Trump soared like an eagle, with most Americans giving his speech a resounding thumbs-up.

The Fakery That is the War on Fake News

By Selwyn Duke

Is it true that one man’s misinformation is another man’s salvation?

Or is it actually true that what man censors is sometimes God’s sublimity?

Author and university lecturer Nolan Higdon may not be pondering anything so ethereal. What he is sure of is that, as he wrote Sunday at Salon, the “war on fake news has backfired.” As to his meaning, his subtitle tells the tale and the Truth. To wit:

“Content moderation was never about eradicating fake news.”

Elon Musk Busts British Muslim Grooming Gang Cover-up Wide Open

By Selwyn Duke

It was a shocking revelation. U.K. authorities ignored a child-trafficking ring — and the beating, terrorizing, and sexual abuse of native British girls — for 16 years. It was for a very troubling reason, too:

The perpetrators were Muslim.

In fact, one whistleblower was actually warned, “You must never [again] refer to Asian [Muslim] men,” and your “awareness of ethnic issues” needs to be raised. Why, she was even forced into “diversity training.”

WARNING: “We Are Still at War”

By Selwyn Duke

The above claim, made just recently, is not about our Ukraine-proxy war with Russia. It’s not about our continuing military actions against the Houthi rebels in Yemen. It’s not about something as mundane as how the U.S. is, technically, still at war with North Korea. Rather, it’s about an ongoing, existential conflict against the most dangerous enemy of all: ourselves.

Or, to be precise, that would be the enemy within — and the good Americans who unwittingly aid that enemy.

Cell Phones Have Been Called “Digital Heroin.” So, Should We Ban Them in School?

By Selwyn Duke

“There was a time, not that many years ago, really, when we would actually get into an argument because we didn’t want to answer the phone,” quite funny and mostly clean comedian James Gregory once said during an act. “It’d be like, ‘You get it; I got it last time!’”

Boy, the world sure has changed. Back then, Gregory continued, the phone was an interruption, taking time away from what you really wanted to do. Now it is what people want to do.

In fact, “screen addiction” is a real phenomenon, so much so that researchers have called electronic devices “digital heroin.” As a result, a movement to ban cell phones in schools is gaining momentum. There’s also been pushback, however. Many are reluctant to live life without that continual digital fix.

Study: Conservatives’ Lies Cause Their Higher Social-media Suspension Rates — So Keep Censoring

By Selwyn Duke

Conservatives, let not your heart be troubled. You are being censored more on social media than liberals are, a new study has discovered. But the researchers can help you solve the problem because, they say, they have identified it.

You.

The study has “found,” you see, that conservatives endure social-media suspension more only because they share more “misinformation.” The remedy?

Just echo mainstream media in your determinations and, “Voila!” — you can express opinions with complete freedom.

Oh, the researchers did “prove” their thesis, using “fact-checkers” such as Snopes.com. (Never mind that site co-founder David Mikkelson was suspended in 2021 for plagiarizing at least 54 articles. And never mind that Snopes has in the past had to confess that some of its fact-checks were false.)