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The American Experiment Has Gone Down In Flames

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By CRAIG STANFILL

 

What are we to do about it?

In the late eighteenth century, a group of unusually enlightened men gathered to plot rebellion against the most powerful military power of the day. Their grievances were many, set down in the Declaration of Independence. This storied document was many things, but above all it was a cry of rebellion against tyranny: against the arbitrary, capricious and unwelcome rule of the English over the colonies. It was a cry for liberty.

Against all odds, their rebellion succeeded and, a few years later, they met once again to devise a form of government that would be strong enough to see to those things that only government can do, such as military defense and the enablement of trade between the states. They were, however, leery of the dangers of tyranny, and so they crafted a unique form of government: a federal republic, with power dispersed among the several states, and numerous checks and balances to prevent abuse.

It was a noble experiment, and it served us well for centuries, but it is essential that we understand that this experiment has now failed in its primary purpose: to secure our liberties and to forestall tyrannical rule.

The evidence of this failure is indisputable to anyone with eyes to see. Unelected bureaucrats can impose their will on the citizenry in a way that so far exceeds the arbitrary and capricious rule of the English as to stagger the imagination.

They are imposing upon us regulations to all but outlaw vehicles powered by fossil fuels. They have decreed that a woman can become a man, and a man can become a woman, with utter disregard for biological reality.

They have colluded with the internet oligarchs to censor dissent and to silence their political opponents. They are using the mechanisms of law enforcement to protect their friends and to persecute their enemies.

The intelligence services are spying on Americans, and the FBI looks more and more like the secret police with every passing day. I am afraid of my government; I fear the knock on the door in the middle of the night. The grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence look trifling by comparison.

If the Democrats get their way, it will get even worse. They have made it clear that they intend to undo the system of checks and balances that have kept tyrants at bay for centuries. They will eliminate the Senate filibuster.

They will pack the Supreme Court and turn it into something like the Soviet Politburo, an organ of political power unaccountable to the people with absolute authority over every aspect of life. They will continue to push for non-citizen voting rights, allowing millions of illegal immigrants to vote in key local and state elections.

And, perhaps worst of all, power will be further centralized in Washington under the Democrats, who will willingly crackdown on local and state governments that don’t adopt their left-wing vision. In short, a form of absolute tyranny will be established.

Our constitution was designed to prevent this from happening. It is time for us to recognize that our experiment in self-rule has failed, and that we must do something about it before it is too late.

How did we get here? It all starts with federal money. Money is, and always has been, a profoundly corrupting influence in government. This has been true throughout history, going back to the Romans and even before.

Money is power. Money is control. Money gives you the ability to reward your friends and punish your enemies. Federal money has become a lever used by the bureaucrats to impose their will on state and local government, emasculating the federal system.

The Biden administration is giving away trillions of dollars in public funds to support its allies and to buy votes with the money they’ve taken from us. But no matter how many trillions of dollars they fritter away, it’s never enough, and they are on the verge of spending the country into bankruptcy. The system they have constructed will inevitably collapse, and take us down with it.

What then shall we do? How can we reclaim our lost freedom and save ourselves from the coming tyranny?

To do this, we need to be as bold as our opposition. They have stated that the American system is to be burned to the ground and replaced with something new. I agree, in part. Yes, burn it to the ground — but replace it instead with something old: the Federal Republic the founders intended us to have. This will require a massive — and I mean massive — reduction in the size and the scope of the government, and a return to its stated purpose, as eloquently laid out in the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

This, and no more.

Craig W. Stanfill (@craigwstanfill) is a computer scientist, software entrepreneur, and the author of the AI Dystopia science fiction series.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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Dan McTeague

Carney launches his crusade against the oilpatch

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Well, he finally did it.

After literally years of rumours that he was preparing to run for parliament and being groomed as Justin Trudeau’s successor.

After he, reportedly, agreed to take over Chrystia Freeland’s job as Finance Minister in December, only to then, reportedly, pull back once her very public and pointed resignation made the job too toxic for someone with his ambitions.

After he even began telegraphing, through surrogates, an openness to joining a Conservative government, likely hoping to preserve some of his beloved environmentalist achievements if and when Pierre Poilievre leads his party into government.

After all that, Mark Carney has finally thrown his hat into the ring for the position of Liberal leader and prime minister of our beloved and beleaguered country.

And, as I’ve been predicting, the whole gang of Trudeau apologists are out in force, jumping for joy and saying this is the best thing since sliced bread. Carney is a breath of fresh air, a man who can finally turn the page on a difficult era in our history, a fighter, and — of all things! — an outsider.

Hogwash!

This narrative conveniently ignores the fact that Carney has been a key Trudeau confidant for years. As Pierre Poilievre pointed out on Twitter/X, he remains listed on the Liberal Party’s website as an advisor to the Prime Minister. He’s godfather to Chrystia Freeland’s son, for heaven’s sake!

Outsider?! This man is an insider’s insider.

But, more importantly, Carney has been a passionate supporter and promoter of the Trudeau government’s agenda, with the job-killing, economy-hobbling Net Zero program right at its heart. The Carbon Tax? He was for it before he was against it, which is to say, before it was clear the popular opposition to it isn’t going away, especially now that we all see what a bite it’s taken out of our household budgets.

Even his course correction was half-hearted. In Carney’s words, the Carbon Tax “served a purpose up until now.” What on earth does that even mean?

Meanwhile, EV mandates, Emission Caps, the War on Pipelines, tax dollars for so-called renewables, and all of the other policies designed to stifle our natural resources imposed on us by the activists in the Trudeau government? They’re right up Carney’s ally.

Plus his record at the Banks of Canada and England, his role as the U.N.’s Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance, and his passion projects like the Global Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), and its subgroup the Net Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA), point to a concerning willingness to achieve his ideological goals by even the most sneaky, underhanded routes.

Take, for instance, the question of whether we need to “phase out” Canada’s oil and gas industry. Politicians who want real power can’t just come out and endorse that position without experiencing major blowback, as Justin Trudeau found out back in 2017. Despite years of activist propaganda, Canadians still recognize that hydrocarbon energy is the backbone of our economy.

But what if oil and gas companies started having trouble getting loans or attracting investment, no matter how profitable they are? Over time they, and the jobs and other economic benefits they provide, would simply disappear.

That is, in essence, the goal of GFANZ. It’s what they mean when they require their members – including Canadian banks like BMO, TD, CIBC, Scotiabank and RBC – to commit to “align[ing] their lending and investment portfolios with net-zero carbon emissions by mid-century or sooner.”

And Mark Carney is their founder and chairman. GFANZ is Mark Carney’s baby.

In truth, Mark Carney is less an outsider than he is the man behind the curtain, the man pulling the strings and poking the levers of power. Not that he will put it this way, but his campaign pitch can be boiled down to, “Trudeau, but without the scandals or baggage.” Well, relatively speaking.

But the thing is, it wasn’t those scandals – as much of an embarrassment as they were — which has brought an unceremonious end to Justin Trudeau’s political career. What laid him low, in the end, was bad policy and governmental mismanagement.

To choose Mark Carney would be to ask for more of the same. Thanks, but no thanks.

Dan McTeague is President of Canadians for Affordable Energy.

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Daily Caller

Opinion: Trump Making ‘Sex’ Great Again On Day One Of Presidency

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Megan Brock

One day into his presidency, Trump has taken significant executive action to preserve the integrity of the sexes and root out gender ideology from the federal government.

Throughout his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump promised to affirm the unique distinctions of the two sexes, male and female, and reverse the spread of gender ideology that was pushed during the Biden administration. Trump kept that promise Monday by signing an executive order (EO) titled “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism And Restoring Biological Truth To The Federal Government,” which defends the integrity of the sexes by mandating the federal government apply “clear and accurate language” that includes requiring the use of the term “sex” over “gender.”

“My Administration will defend women’s rights and protect freedom of conscience by using clear and accurate language and policies that recognize women are biologically female, and men are biologically male,” the EO states.

“When administering or enforcing sex-based distinctions, every agency and all Federal employees acting in an official capacity on behalf of their agency shall use the term ‘sex’ and not ‘gender’ in all applicable Federal policies and documents.”

Trump’s order defines male and female as “immutable biological” classifications, noting that “sex” is not synonymous with the term “gender identity.”

“‘Sex’ shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female. ‘Sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity’,” the EO states.

“Gender Identity” is a term used by transgender activists to describe an individual’s imagined sex. Transgender activists believe a person’s imagined sex is as real as their physical sex, and should hold equal weight in society and law.

For example, in April 2024 the Biden administration expanded Title IX regulations, which prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, to include “gender identity,” giving men claiming to have a female “gender identity” full legal access to women’s sports and private spaces. A federal judge recently struck down the expanded Title IX regulations in a lawsuit filed against the Biden administration by six states, including Tennessee.

Jordanne Kemper, campaign director for Independent Women, praised Trump for protecting women by correctly defining the terms “gender identity” and “sex.”
“Words must have meaning. The radical view that ‘gender identity’ means the same things as ‘sex’ proved that when words aren’t defined, women pay the price,” said Kemper.
“President Trump’s executive order recognizes the erosion of women’s rights and denounces the conflation of ‘gender identity’ and ‘sex’. Now the government and our courts can’t misconstrue laws intended for women and girls. The American people asked for this clarity and President Trump delivered,” Kemper added.

Transgender activists often use the terms “gender” and “gender identity” interchangeably.

The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) described how these terms are used synonymously in their gender medical guidance, called the Standards of Care version 8 (SOC 8), which is routinely used by medical associations, governments, and insurance companies in the U.S. and abroad to create policy driven by gender ideology.

“Depending on the context, gender may reference gender identity, gender expression, and/or social gender role, including understandings and expectations culturally tied to people who were assigned male or female at birth,” the SOC 8 states.

“Gender identities other than those of men and women (who can be either cisgender or transgender) include transgender, nonbinary, genderqueer, gender neutral, agender, gender fluid, and “third” gender, among others; many other genders are recognized around the world.”

This muddying of language is found throughout medical institutions including The National Institutes of Health who define gender as “A multidimensional construct that encompasses gender identity and expression, as well as social and cultural expectations about status, characteristics, and behavior as they are associated with certain sex traits.”

The Trump administration acknowledged how the corruption of language by transgender activists has had an “corrosive impact” on American society, stating: “The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system,” in the EO. “Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself.”

The term “gender identity” was popularized in the 1960s by controversial sexologist John Money, whose most high-profile experiment involved advising parents of a boy whose penis was damaged in a botched circumcision to cut the rest of it off and raise him as a girl. At age 15, the boy — who was raised as “Brenda” — discovered the truth and rejected further hormone treatments. He eventually committed suicide at age 38.

Gender ideology believes a person’s sex can differ from their “gender identity,” rejecting the long-established scientific understanding of biology that there are only two sexes based on the fact there are only two types of reproductive cells — sperm and ova.

The very concept of “gender identity” creates the possibility of changing one’s sex — a biological impossibility — through medical interventions, therefore creating a demand for medical sex reassignment interventions.

WPATH defines “gender identity” in the SOC 8 as “a person’s deeply felt, internal, intrinsic sense of their own gender,” whereas the Trump administration defines it as “A fully internal and subjective sense of self, disconnected from biological reality.”

The EO further explains that because “gender identity” is wholly subjective to the individual, it cannot be used to replace the objective reality of sex.

“‘Gender identity’ reflects a fully internal and subjective sense of self, disconnected from biological reality and sex and existing on an infinite continuum, that does not provide a meaningful basis for identification and cannot be recognized as a replacement for sex,” Trump’s EO states.

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