Honesty

Perspectives, Not Truth: Why Our Moral Codes Are Always Incomplete

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Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.

Marcus Aurelius

I will attempt to bring multiple threads together in this blog and the quote above is a good starting point. If there is objective reality it’s not going to be something possessed by one human. We do not know all circumstances nor can we vet and independently verify every fact we receive.  Or at least not without becoming totally hamstrung by the details. We put our trust in parties, traditions, systems, credentials and the logic which makes sense to us.

The deeper we dive into our physical reality the murkier it all gets. The world ‘above’ that we encounter feels concrete. But there is not a whole lot of substance to be found as we get beneath the surface. The rules that we discovered—of time and space—end up dissolving into a sea of probabilities and paradoxes at a quantum level that we don’t have an answer to. And this is the ‘concrete’ observable reality. We all see our own unique perspective, a slice, and build our model of the world from it.

But it is even murkier when we get to topics of social science. Morality and ethics, built often from what we believe is fact or truth, is more simply opinion and perspective than it can be hammered out in words everyone is able to agree on. Even for those who are of the same foundational religious assumptions—despite even having the same source texts—do not agree on matters of interpretation or application. So who is right? And who is wrong? How do we decide?

1) Patrick: We Don’t Need God To Be Moral

My cousin, Patrick, a taller, better looking and more educated version of myself, an independent thinker, and has departed from his missionary upbringing—gives this great little presentation: “Where Do You Get Your Morality?“

His foundation for a moral value system is concepts of truth, freedom and love which he describes in the video. I find it to be compelling and compatible with my own basic views. Our cooperation is as natural as competition, it is what makes us human, and a conscience gives potential for better returns.

However, while I agree with his ideal, there is also reason why deception, tyranny and indifference are as common in the world—they are natural—and this is because it can give one person or tribe an advantage. Lies, scams, and political propaganda all exploit trust and can be a shortcut for gaining higher status or more access.

No, cheating doesn’t serve everyone. But the lion has no reason to regret taking down a slow gazelle. By removing the weak, sick, or injured, it inadvertently culls the less-fit genes from the herd, strengthening the prey population over time and even preventing overgrazing of the savannah. It’s just a raw service to ecosystem balance, much like a short seller who exposes those overvalued stocks, forcing the market corrections and greater efficiency—acts of pure self-interest yielding a broader good.

Not a friendly neighbor.

Herd cooperation or predator opportunism are different strategies, both 100% natural and amoral in their own context. I’m neither psychopath nor a cannibal, but I do suspect those who are those things would as readily rationalize their own drives and proclivities. Nature doesn’t come with a rulebook—only consequences.

I’m certainly not a fan of the “might makes right” way of thinking and that is because my morality and ethics originate from the perspective being disadvantaged. But I also understand why those who never struggled and who have the power to impose their own will without fear of facing any consequences often develop a different moral framework.

We need to be invested in the same moral and civilizational project. Or else logic, that works for only some who have the strength or propaganda tools, will rule by default. I don’t disagree with Patrick, but his core message caters to a high IQ and high empathy crowd—which does leave me wondering how we can bring everyone else on board?

2) Kirk: A Way To Focus Our Moral Efforts

Charlie Kirk wasn’t a significant figure to me before his death. It may be a generational thing or just a general lack of interest in the whole conservative influencer crowd. I feel dumber any time I listen to Steven Crowder and assumed Kirk was just another one of the partisan bomb throwers. But, from my exposure to his content since, I have gained some appreciation.

Bring back the Ten Commandments, because it worked so well the first time?

Arguing for the Ten Commandments has never been a priority for me. It’s a list with a context and not standalone. Nevertheless it is a starting point for a moral discussion and also one that it seems Charlie Kirk would go to frequently in his campus debates.  The two most difficult of these laws to explain to a religious skeptic are certainly the first two: “I am the Lord your God; Have no other gods before me and do not make idols.”

We generally agree on prohibition of murder and theft, or even adultery, but will disagree on one lawgiver and judge.

Why?

Well, it is simply because divine entity is abstract compared to things we have experienced—like the murder of a loved one or something being stolen from us. You just know this is wrong based on how it makes you feel. The belief in celestial being beyond human sight or comprehension just does not hit the same way as events we have observed. And it’s also the baggage the concept of a God carries in the current age. I mean, whose God?

It seems to be much easier just to agree the lowest common denominator: Don’t do bad things to other people.

But then we don’t. We justify killing others if it suits our political agenda, labeling people as bad for doing what we would do if facing a similar threat to our rights. If I’ve learned one thing it is that people always find creative ways to justify themselves while condemning the other side for even fighting back against an act of aggression.

Self-proclaimed good people do very bad things to good people. Like most people see themselves as above average drivers (not mathematically possible), we tend to distort things in favor of ourselves. Fundamental attribution error means we excuse our own compromises as a result of circumstances while we assume an immutable character flaw when others violate us. We might be half decent at applying morality to others—but exempt ourselves and our own.

So morality needs a focal point beyond us as individuals. There must be a universal or common good. Which might be the value of a theoretical ‘other’ who observes from a detached and perfectly unprejudiced point, the ideal judge. Not as a placeholder, but as the ultimate aim of humanity. One God. One truth. One justice. This as the answer to double standards, selective outrage and partisan bias. If we’re all seeking the same thing there is greater potential of harmony and social cohesion where all benefit.

At very least it would be good to promote an idea of an ultimate consequence giver that can’t be bought or bribed.

3) The Good, the Bad and the Aim for What Is Practically Impossible

The devil is always in the details. And the whole point of government is to mediate in this regard. Unfortunately, government, like all institutions, is merely a tool and tools are only as good as the hands that are making a use of them. A hammer is usually used to build things, but can also be used to bash in a skull. Likewise, we can come up with that moral system and yet even the best formed legal code or enforcement mechanism can be twisted—definitions beaten into what the current ruling regime needs.

The United States of America started with a declaration including the words “all men are created equal” and a Constitution with that starts: “We the people…” This is reflection of the Christian rejection of favoritism and St. Paul telling the faithful “there is no Jew or Greek” or erasing the supremacy claims of some. An elite declaring themselves to be exempted or specially chosen by God is not compatible with this vision. We never ask a chicken for consent what we take the eggs. We do not extend rights to those who we consider to be inferior to us or less than human. Human rights hinge on respect for the other that transcends politics.

That’s where the labels come in. If we call someone a Nazi, illegal, MAGAt, leftist or a Goyim we are saying that they are less than human and don’t deserve rights. This is the tribal and identity politics baseline. Those in the out-group are excluded for decency, their deaths celebrated as justice (even if there’s no due process) and we’ll excuse or privilege our own. All sides of the partisan divide do this—we create a reason to deny rights to others often using things like truth, freedom and love (Patrick’s foundation) as our justification: “Those terrorists hate our freedom and democracy, we must fight for those we love and our truth!”

Bringing this to a practical level: Looking at Minneapolis, the ICE and anti-ICE activities, we have competing moral narratives and a different vision for application of American values. On one side of the debate you have those who say that “one is one too many” if an illegal immigrant kills a US citizen—then suddenly do not care when Federal agents shoot a fellow American. The defiant “don’t tread on me” opposition to mandates and masks during Covid somehow shifting to “comply or die!” On the other side you have those outraged about Kyle Rittenhouse and who have been traditionally opposed to the 2nd Amendment defending Alex Pretti while the Trump administration condemns a man for carrying a permitted firearm.

Judgment is for the other, it seems, rights for those who look like us or agree. It’s this inconsistent eye, the call for understanding of our own and grace for ourselves with the harsh penalties applied to those within the forever shifting lines of our out-group, that shows how our political perspectives cloud our moral judgment. The ‘sin’ is not the act itself, but whether or not the violation suits our broader agenda. This is why ‘Christian’ fundamentalists, who will preach the love of Jesus on Sunday, can be totally indifferent to the suffering of children with darker skin tones—their God is about national schemes not a universal good or a commonly applied moral standard.

The aim needs to be justice that is blind to who and only considers what was done. If pedophilia is excused for powerful people who run our government and economy, then it should be for those at the bottom as well. If the misdemeanor of crossing an invisible line is bad, a justification for suspension of due process for all Americans, then why is it okay to violate the sovereignty of Venezuela or Iran over claims of human rights abuse?

The US fought a war of independence, took the country for the British and yet has been acting as a dictator, installing kings, when it suits our neo-colonial elites.

That’s immoral.

We’re all immoral.

The moral code of Patrick, Charlie or myself is incomplete—because every moral code is incomplete when filtered through human eyes. We start from our different premises: Patrick’s secular triad of truth, freedom, and love; Kirk’s religious appeal to the Ten Commandments and a divine lawgiver as the only reliable check on self-deception; my own reluctant recognition that empathy and cooperation are real, yet fragile, against the raw arithmetic of power and advantage. Yet all of our approaches circle the same problem: without some external, impartial standard that transcends our biases, tribes, and self-justifications, our morality devolves into competing opinions dressed as facts—exactly as Aurelius observed.

We cannot fully escape the murk. Objective reality, if it exists, slips through our fingers like quantum probabilities—and moral truth fractures along lines of culture, experience, and interest. Even when we agree on broad principles (don’t murder, don’t steal), the application often splinters: whose life counts as being worthy of protection? Whose borders, laws, or children deserve a defense? And whose “justice” is merely revenge in better lighting?The temptation is cynicism—just declare all values relative, retreat to my own personal pragmatism, and then let might (or votes, or algorithms) sort the rest. But that is a path leads to the very outcomes we decry—dehumanization, selective outrage, and the erosion of the entire civilizational project that allows agnostic high-empathy and high-IQ arguments like Patrick’s to even exist. Yes, nature may be amoral, but us humans build societies by pretending otherwise, by our aiming higher than baser ‘animal’ instincts—reaching for God.

So perhaps the most honest conclusion is not to claim possession of the full truth, but to commit to pursuing it together—knowing we’ll never quite arrive. We definitely need focal points that force some accountability beyond ourselves: whether that’s a concept of one ultimate observer who sees without favoritism, or by a shared commitment to universal human dignity rooted in principle beyond biology or tribe, or simply just the hard-won habit of applying the same rules to our side as to the other. Blind justice isn’t natural or self-evident—it’s cultivated. Morality is an aim which requires vigilance against our own double standards, humility before the limits of our perspective, and courage to defend principles we claim even when they inconvenience us.

In the end, we don’t need perfect agreement on the source of morality to agree that inconsistency in application is poisonous.  What goes around will certainly come around and if we live by the sword we’ll die by it.  If we can at least hold each other (and ourselves) to a standard higher than “what works for my group right now,” preserve the space for mutually beneficial cooperation over cruel predation—a shared conscience over mere convenience. Anything less, and the gazelle never outruns the lion for long—and neither does the society which forgets why it tried.

Lies, Damned Lies, and AI — The Machine Can’t Replace Mind

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AI is an exciting new tool—kind of like Wikipedia was back in the day, something fun to turn to for those quick answers. But let’s be clear: AI is NOT a replacement for actual research. No, it isn’t an independent mind, and it’s certainly no impartial judge. All it really does is take the content that’s currently acceptable to its creators and then will synthesize it into responses. And it will lie to you outright, with zero conscience, because it has no conscience at all. It’s a sophisticated machine, a tool, nothing more or less, and it can absolutely be manipulated by the agendas of those behind the scenes who run it.

Like Wikipedia or so-called fact-checkers, at best, AI reflects the current bias or the established narrative. A perfect example of this is the lab leak theory for Covid-19’s origins. Back when some of us were talking about it, we were being “debunked” (some even banned), only for things to reverse later. As of early 2025, the CIA has assessed that a research lab origin is more likely than a natural one. So, to all the “sources please” crowd: beware. There’s no substitute for building your own knowledge base and using your own brain to evaluate things independently of official or established organizations.

AI is probably less reliable than your GPS. Sure, the tool works most of the time, but it’s no replacement for your own eyes or basic navigation skills. “Death by GPS” is a real category for a reason—if the machine were totally accurate, people wouldn’t drive off cliffs or into lakes after following bad directions. We need our own internal map, built on some established waypoints and a landmark or two, rather than just plugging in an address and blindly following the device into the abyss. Above all, we need a strong internal BS detector, we need it because the tool belongs to them—and it does what its creators need it to do. And telling you the unvarnished truth isn’t always the priority.

At its very best, AI will reflect the currently available information and most dominant narrative. Imagine, had the technology been available, asking it about the threat of Covid early on—it very likely would have dismissed outlier concerns as rumors, downplayed the disease in comparison to the seasonal flu, maybe even lectured about racism—while echoing the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s encouragement, February of 2020, to visit those crowded streets of San Francisco’s Chinatown in total defiance of emerging fears. (A family member ridiculed me for saying Covid would be a big deal at that time—dutifully citing mainstream media sources saying it was less worrisome than the seasonal flu.)

People have also very quickly forgotten how The Lancet published a deeply flawed study in the critical early weeks of the pandemic claiming hydroxychloroquine was extremely dangerous—only to quietly retract it later because the authors couldn’t verify the authenticity of the data. In short, the data was totally unreliable, and was a study based on falsehoods presented as science. If that was the “reliable” information being fed into an AI system back then, what would it have told you the scientific consensus was? It would have parroted the lie, and made it as unreliable as the retracted paper during the most urgent phase of the crisis. AI didn’t exist in its current form at the time, but its behavior would have mirrored exactly what I describe: reflecting the biased mainstream thought rather than truly act as a functioning as an independent thinker.

AI lags behind reality. A semi-independent mind—one relying on their personal intelligence and a grounded model of the world—can oftentimes do better. When I saw the early images coming out of Wuhan and listened to reports from doctors there (some of whom later died or disappeared), I knew this was not just the seasonal flu. It didn’t matter how many three-letter agencies were being quoted by corporate media; I could make my own judgment. I also quickly realized how terribly politicized even a pandemic can become. People didn’t pick sides based on the evidence—instead, they chased (or even invented) evidence to confirm their partisan narratives.

If AI had existed back then, it would have picked a side based on what its owners wanted. Covid is where I really honed my BS detector and learned that both sides lie—not that I was oblivious before, but seeing it play out in real time was very eye-opening. Partisans would flip positions the moment their preferred politicians did. Suddenly, independent voices raising alarms (with Trump leaning that way) became the target, then Democrats outflanked this with total hysteria after their months of denial when it actually mattered. We saw the same flip with Operation Warp Speed: with the left as vaccine skeptics while Trump promoted them, only for the Democrats pushing hard for mandates while Republicans opposed even masks.

How fast a symbol of oppression/security can become a symbol of oppression/security.  Questions remain about effectiveness in either context.

Now, identity-obscuring masks are back in style as authoritarian right-wing fashion, as ICE agents terrorize, and insurrections are now cool again for Democrats who dislike immigration laws or the last election results. And AI won’t fix any of this partisanship—especially when people use it without understanding how it works or its severe limitations.

At best, AI is a good supplement or starting point for someone who already knows how to ask the right questions. At worst, it will lie and give you exactly what you want to hear. But one thing is certain: AI is NOT an objective truth-teller. Rely on your own reasoning, your own research, your own past experience, the reliable voices you have vetted on your own or your own BS detector first. The AI machine is no substitute. Yes, independent thinking is tough, in practice, and yet we must be smarter than the tool.  Journalism, Wikipedia, or fact-checkers and GPS—all of these things are reliable… until they’re not.

More Death in Minneapolis: Questions About Federal Enforcement and Accountability

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The recent fatal shooting of Alex Jeffrey Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital, by U.S. Border Patrol agents has left many Americans—including many who identify as conservative—grappling with deep unease. On January 24, 2026, amid escalating protests against Federal immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis, Pretti was executed while trying to protect a woman from Federal agents who had just knocked her down. Multiple eyewitness videos, verified by major outlets like The New York Times and NBC News, show Pretti holding a phone—not a gun—while attempting to assist a woman who had been shoved to the ground. Federal officials initially claimed self-defense, alleging he approached with a weapon, but sworn witness testimonies and footage contradict this, describing him as non-resistant and focused on helping others.

Pretti was a dedicated healthcare worker who cared for veterans, an avid outdoorsman, and a U.S. citizen with no criminal record beyond minor traffic issues. He had a valid firearms permit, was legally carrying at the time of the confrontation, but evidence indicates no firearm was brandished. His family has condemned the official narrative as “sickening lies,” and protests erupted almost immediately, with Minnesota officials like Gov. Tim Walz calling the incident “sickening” and demanding an end to what they describe as a federal “occupation.” It marks the second fatal shooting of a US citizen by Federal agents in Minneapolis this month, following Renee Good’s death on January 7.

What disturbs me most is the reaction from the MAGA right-wing. Pretti has been quickly labeled as a “Communist” or “domestic terrorist” online, often solely based on his presence at the protests against immigration raids or the unverified social media claims. Yet reliable reports portray him as apolitical in daily life—as kind, service-oriented, and uninterested in partisan drama.  His friends and colleagues emphasize his true commitment to saving lives, not disrupting them. Celebrating or dismissing his death, dehumanizing him with labels, because he fits a convenient ideological enemy is profoundly wrong. Rights violations don’t depend on politics.  No, due process and presumption of innocence apply to everyone, even (or especially) those we disagree with.

This selective outrage highlights a deeper issue not being addressed: this is political retribution disguised as enforcement. Minnesota has a very small illegal immigrant population compared to other states, around 95,000–130,000 (per recent Pew Research and state analyses), nothing like Texas (2.1 million) or Florida (1.6 million)—red states with far larger numbers. And yet Federal resources, including thousands of ICE, Border Patrol, and DHS agents deployed since late 2025, have disproportionately targeted blue Minnesota with sanctuary-like policies. Freezing billions in Federal funds to the state and overriding local law enforcement appears to be punitive, aimed at breaking political resistance rather than uniform honest immigration control.

This echoes historical patterns of a central power crushing regional autonomy, and most starkly in Joseph Stalin’s use of starvation against Ukraine during the Holodomor of 1932–1933. Stalin had deliberately engineered a man-made famine to suppress Ukrainian nationalism and resistance to Soviet collectivization, killing millions through grain seizures, border blockades, and denial of aid—this framed as necessary for national unity and ideological purity, but was clearly intended to crush a semi-autonomous region’s defiance. Here, the heavy-handed federal deployment in Minnesota—targeting a state resisting central directives—clearly mirrors that authoritarian tactic: punish non-compliance under the guise of security, erode local sovereignty, and break any “resistance” to the regime’s aims.

The US Constitution originally designed states as semi-sovereign entities—much like small nations —with the Federal government focused on their defense and on interstate affairs. Expansions of Federal authority—starting as an unfortunate byproduct of Lincoln’s Civil War centralization of power and those Reconstruction-era impositions, shifted the balance. Today’s actions—militarized deployments without state consent, the killings during protests, and limited (or non-existent) cooperation in investigations—violate the 10th Amendment’s spirit. A Federal judge has already issued a restraining order on DHS crowd-control tactics, and multiple states have since joined legal challenges calling them “militarized and illegal.”

George Orwell diagnosed this in 1984: regimes manufacture perpetual enemies to justify control—using propaganda to invert reality.  Fear of “outsiders” or “internal threats” (protesters, or sanctuary cities) is stoked to excuse force, while media—dominated by a few billionaire-aligned outlets—amplifies narratives that dumb down discourse. Some cheer Federal agents after these killings, seeing them as heroes against an illegal “invasion,” yet ignore contradictions like inaction in red states with bigger populations.  People who just a couple years ago decried Covid mandates and the slaying of Ashli Babbitt now seem to see FAFO as a moral argument.  It’s always the same playbook: dehumanize, divide, and centralize the decision making power.

The above is brazen disinformation with an agency logo.  They’re distorting and misleading people.

The right-wing is just as collectivist and dumb as those who they derided as being leftist, Socialist or Communist.  They couldn’t articulate a logical consistent argument in defense of their irrational smorgasbord approach to ethics and morality, it is just whatever is expedient in the moment and on the whim of their Big Brother stand in (DJT) as the billionaires technocrats decide how they will manage us unruly human cattle.

Partisans keep flip flopping.  The truly principled do not change and stand for “liberty and justice for all” as they pledged.

Orwell didn’t foresee AI and mass surveillance tools like Palantir, but the parallels are eerie. During COVID, many on the right had decried overreach in the name of liberty; now, similar authoritarian capabilities are embraced when aimed at perceived enemies. They fail to see the machine they’re building will also be turned on them.  They reveal themselves as tools rather than moral thinkers.  This hypocrisy reveals how various systems of control operate identically—whether they’re labeled Socialist, authoritarian, woke or otherwise—they erode rights selectively until they target anyone dissenting.

Pretti’s death isn’t about immigration politics alone; it’s about the erosion of constitutional norms, the weaponization of federal power against states, and the willingness to overlook violations when the victim is painted as “the other.” True conservatism should defend limited government, state sovereignty, and individual rights always—not cheer when Federal agents kill citizens in the street (then clap in celebration) over disputed enforcement actions. If we accept this for “Communists” today, tomorrow it could be anyone labeled an enemy.  When a regime is given permission to abuse Nazis then everyone is a Nazi if they stand up to the regime.  That’s how this works and smart people aren’t a party to it.

Yes, the agents clapped and said “boo hoo” learning of the ICU nurse’s death.  Very similar to the attitude of Jonathan Ross who exclaimed “fucking bitch” after he shot a woman in the face.

We need accountability, especially at the top, in a time when our President’s wealth has doubled as he continues to protect pedophile predator elites, we need to ask why release of the Epstein files is being and unlawfully slow walked.  We need to have independent investigations of these killings, transparency on bodycam footage, and an end to punitive Federal overreach. Lives like that of Alex Pretti’s—of ordinary Americans trying to help in chaotic moments imposed by officials who only double down rather than deescalate—deserve better than propaganda-fueled dismissal.  We do not want to wait until two becomes two million—we either stand together now against a budding authoritarian regime or we fall separately.

Abraham’s Righteousness vs. Caiaphas’s Calculus: Divergent Ethics in Modern Conflicts

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Relating to a coworker about how hard it is for me to transmit certain values absent a cultural context, with how deeply ingrained they are as part of my religious upbringing, in pondering this reality it becomes easy to understand why so many people—myself included, at times—assume their own moral framework is universal, something everyone else must naturally share.

This moment of realization tied to a broader observation about value systems and how wildly different various religious traditions really are despite sharing some of the same foundational texts—they are fundamentally and irrevocably different. And yet because the texts overlap, some people mistakenly treat those systems as essentially similar—or even interchangeable—overlooking the profound divergences in interpretation, emphasis, or lived practice that centuries of distinct cultural evolution in these systems of thought have produced.

I plan to make three stops: one in the frame of contemporary Western thought, the next from the time of Jesus, and lastly with the patriarch Abraham. And with each of these stops explore how shared origin can mask strikingly divergent ethical worlds, and why recognizing those differences matters more than ever in our interconnected age.

Innocent Until Proven Guilty and the Blackstone Ratio

Wrongful convictions happen. We often assume, since someone was charged, that they must be guilty of something. I mean, why else would they be wearing that orange jumpsuit? But this impulse goes contrary to reality where cops plant evidence, people lie, and prejudice plays a role in judgment. 

This was the case with Brian Banks—who had been accused of rape by a classmate who later, after his years in prison, confessed to fabricating the whole account. What a horrible predicament: your whole future blown up, a jury that only sees your guilt.

A jurist, Sir William Blackstone, understanding the imperfection of the justice system and that the ultimate goal of justice is to protect the innocent, proposed:

It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer

This, the Blackstone ratio, is foundational to how things are at least supposed to work in the United States. Founding father Ben Franklin actually took the concept further by stating, “it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer.”  John Adams, while he defended the British soldiers charged with murder for their role in the Boston Massacre, argued the following:

We find, in the rules laid down by the greatest English Judges, who have been the brightest of mankind; We are to look upon it as more beneficial, that many guilty persons should escape unpunished, than one innocent person should suffer. The reason is, because it’s of more importance to community, that innocence should be protected, than it is, that guilt should be punished; for guilt and crimes are so frequent in the world, that all of them cannot be punished; and many times they happen in such a manner, that it is not of much consequence to the public, whether they are punished or not. But when innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, especially to die, the subject will exclaim, it is immaterial to me, whether I behave well or ill; for virtue itself is no security. And if such a sentiment as this should take place in the mind of the subject, there would be an end to all security whatsoever.

This commitment to the innocent reflects a strong emphasis on individual rights. It also seems rooted in the story most defining of Western religion, and that is the story of Jesus—falsely accused and put to death for the sake of political expediency. This has become the defining narrative and a reason to reflect on our judgment rather than react. It is why many principled conservatives are always uncomfortable with those trials in the court of public opinion where the state parades a prosecuted person and people assume this is proof of an airtight case.

You look guilty just for being in a courtroom defending from an accusation.

Tyler Robinson currently stands accused of murdering Charlie Kirk. Some have decided his guilt to the extent of forgiving him prior to his even standing trial or being given the chance to defend himself—as if there’s just no way that anyone other than him could be involved. That’s not justice; that’s denying him a presumption of innocence and might be enabling others to escape accountability for their involvement. It is better that he go free than chance a wrongful conviction—that is just Christian.

Caiaphas’s Expediency Math: Killing One to Save All

At the completely opposite end of the spectrum from the Christian West is the example of the high priest who claimed the murder of an innocent man was necessary to save Israel from destruction:

Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”

 (John 11:49-50 NIV)

This may very well be the origin point of trolley problem moral reasoning, where a hypothetical situation is proposed in which an intervention will cost fewer lives. If we just switch the track, this fictional trolley only kills one rather than multiple people. And it seems very reasonable. Isn’t it better when more people survive?

Caiaphas reasoned it was better to kill one Jesus to save Israel.  But it didn’t work out that way. The entire nation—along with their temple and sacrificial system—was forever destroyed in 70 AD. The high priest’s moral reasoning was compromised and wrong. It did not save Israel to kill one man and may well have been part of what eventually led to the destruction of Jerusalem. Those who did not accept the way of Jesus continued, after his ministry ended, to kill his followers and resist their civil authorities. Had they taken one moment to reflect and reconsider their plan to kill their way to peace, they may have survived intact rather than be spread to the corners of the empire.

The problem with killing one—without a just cause, to secure the future—is that it usually doesn’t end there. Kill one and you’ll kill ten; if you kill ten, you’ll kill 100, until soon it is millions upon millions. We see this in the campaign against Gaza. Tens of thousands of children are slaughtered and this is being justified as a war against terror. The reality is that it may very well create the backlash that will make the Zionist project untenable as people see this notion of blood guilt and collective punishment as repulsive. This is not compatible with the Christian values of the West and will lead to our destruction if the escalation of war is not rejected.

The world is better when we don’t play God and use the expediency math. If you’re okay killing one innocent person, you’re now an enemy of all humanity. And if you are willing to kill one, then the second and third come much easier. Innocent life should always be protected—whether it is the life of Jesus, be it the “enemies'” children, or the  unborn. Pro-life means no excuses for the IDF that don’t equally apply to Hamas. If it is okay for the Zionist regime to kill scores of civilians as “collateral damage” for every militant killed—where even the Israelis admit the victims of their onslaught are 83% civilians—why mourn when it is just a handful in Bondi?

Schlanger, brandishing a rifle, was 100% affiliated with those killing civilians in Gaza.  By the IDF standard, he is equally guilty because of his proximity and sympathies.

The best protection of innocent people, like your own, is to oppose all killing of innocent people no matter the color of their skin or the clothes they wear. If the IDF can kill a journalist claiming they are “Hamas with a camera” or “Hamas-affiliated,” then why is it wrong for Eli Schlanger, who has materially aided a genocide, to be targeted along with his associates? We need to reject this math of expediency no matter who is using it, or we can’t be upset when what goes around finally comes around.

Abraham’s Plea for Mercy: Sparing the Many for the Few Righteous

Now we can go way back, to the book of Genesis, where the world’s most powerful monotheistic religions find their foundation, and this man of faith named Abraham. We join him prior to the destruction of Sodom and have this interesting exchange:

Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?  Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him.  For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”  Then the Lord said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”  The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the Lord. Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? 

(Genesis 18:17-23 NIV)

Abraham’s opening question, in the passage above, tells you a whole lot about his moral reasoning. But before that you basically have the old covenant explained in brief: The blessing that was being bestowed on Abraham had to do with “doing what is right and just” or not simply being a blood relative of him, which is something that Jesus and the Apostles explained over and over to those who saw their genetic tie to the patriarch as a sort of entitlement and did not act justly or mercifully as he did.

Continuing in the text, take time to contrast the expediency math of Caiaphas with the following:

What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it?  Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” The Lord said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.” Then Abraham spoke up again: “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, though I am nothing but dust and ashes, what if the number of the righteous is five less than fifty? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five people?” “If I find forty-five there,” he said, “I will not destroy it.” Once again he spoke to him, “What if only forty are found there?” He said, “For the sake of forty, I will not do it.” Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak. What if only thirty can be found there?” He answered, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”  Abraham said, “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty can be found there?” He said, “For the sake of twenty, I will not destroy it.” Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?” He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”  When the Lord had finished speaking with Abraham, he left, and Abraham returned home.

(Genesis 18:24-33 NIV)

Abraham, after expressing his concern for the innocent, offers an opening bid at fifty righteous. Will God spare the entire wicked city for just fifty? And the first thing that is obvious is his humility, pleading with “I am nothing but dust and ashes” and showing his attitude before God. Second is that his orientation is toward the sparing of innocent life even if it means the evil people of the city of Sodom escape deserved judgment. This is in line with Blackstone’s ratio and in total opposition to Caiaphas, who argued to sacrifice rather than to protect the righteous one. Eventually Abraham concedes, and it makes more sense just to evacuate those righteous—nevertheless the righteous are not destroyed with the wicked.

So why is this account in Genesis?

Why is God engaged in a negotiation with a mere man?

The answer is that this anecdote is here for a reason, and that is to be instructive. The author of Genesis isn’t just telling us that Abraham was righteous—they’re giving us instruction on how to be righteous. To have the same disposition as Abraham, that’s the way to be a child of Abraham, and the path of righteousness that leads to the blessings through God’s promise. Chosen means you believe and obey the Lord. You can’t claim to be children of God, or of Abraham, if you truly share nothing in common with them in terms of your behavior or spirit. Genesis is telling us what that looks like in practice.

Christian Orientation Towards Mercy and Humanity is Truly Abrahamic.

In traversing these three moments—from courtrooms shaped by Christian reflection on an innocent’s crucifixion, to the high priest’s fateful expediency that failed to save his nation, and back to Abraham’s humble plea for mercy amid judgment—we uncover a profound reality: The orientation of the Christian perspective, underpinning American rights, is directly the opposite of the ideological lineage of Caiaphas.

The commitment, in faith, to protecting that one innocent life in a crowd of evil is to be a son or daughter of Abraham.  Those who do the opposite, who are willing to sacrifice the innocent for sake of expediency, carry none of the character of Abraham and cannot be the heirs of anything promised to him.  They must first repent of their sin—then they can be blessed, with all nations, through the one singular seed of Abraham (Gal 3:16) which is Christ Jesus.

Going back to the start and those ethics ingrained in us through a religiously derived culture and our assumptions, those who have rejected Christ and are completely willing to kill innocent people to accomplish ends are also going to manifest the other evil traits of Proverbs 6:16-19:

There are six things the Lord hates, seven that are detestable to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush into evil, a false witness who pours out lies and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.

Those of us raised in an Anabaptist church got a strong dose of the Gospel according to Matthew and were taught that speech should be simple and truthful.  Let your yea be yes, and nay be nay is about truly honest conversation and credibility without relying on oaths.  We were told to have a peaceable spirit and merciful approach with all people—to be humble.  

This is an orientation that many of Christian faith may believe is universal.  Except it is not.  Ethno-supremacist pride is okay with those of certain ideologies, deception for sake of gaining an upper hand is looked at like a virtue, they look at their ability to trick you as proof they are superior, and sow the seeds of division covertly not to be caught—like this example:

In a covert operation during 2007–2008, Israeli Mossad agents impersonated CIA officers—using forged U.S. passports, American currency, and CIA credentials—to recruit members of the Pakistan-based Sunni militant group Jundallah for attacks inside Iran, including bombings and assassinations targeting Iranian officials and civilians, as part of a broader effort to destabilize Tehran’s regime amid nuclear tensions. The deception, conducted openly in places like London, aimed to frame the United States as the sponsor, exploiting Jundallah’s sectarian and separatist motives while providing plausible deniability for Israel; U.S. officials uncovered the ruse through internal investigations debunking earlier media reports of CIA involvement, leading to outrage in the Bush White House (with President Bush reportedly “going ballistic”), strained intelligence cooperation under Obama, and the eventual U.S. terrorist designation of Jundallah in 2010, though no public repercussions were imposed on Israel.

 (Overview above by Grok, read: False Flag)

Imagine having a friend who deliberately set you up for a fight against another person by telling them that you said something about them.  My son had a bully do this to him on the bus and this is exactly what so-called ‘greatest ally’ tried to do to the US.  For the Zionist regime, and Mossad, conducting the terror operation via a Pakistani proxy simply was not enough.  They wanted Iran to think the attacks originated with the US in order to provoke a reaction.  And this is how the world becomes a cesspool, all because the Iranians won’t stand idle while Palestinians are deprived of land and human rights.

Deviousness is not exclusive to the children of Caiaphas.  But there’s no stops for those willing to kill innocent people for the sake of expediency.  And a partnership with them is only going to undermine the foundation of our civilization.  The US and ‘Christian’ West have already lost their moral reputation for this unholy alliance.  We need to repent and return to holding evil men accountable and protecting the innocent or all will be lost—we can’t exempt some from a standard of normal decency without also damaging all of Christendom.

“You’re Thirty Years Old Living In Milton”

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The quote in title, an unintentionally honest comment from a pious young woman, will continue to ring in my ears for decades to come. Scripture describes the word of God being “sharper than any two-edged sword,” but her romantic rejection came more like a hammer blow to my Mennonite worldview where spiritual was supposed to outweigh physical gain. I had patterned my life, up to that point, around a sort of practicality over flash and suddenly realized what I thought was an asset was actually liability.

I was reminded of these words again as my wife’s glowing approval of the monstrosity in my driveway, a Ford Explorer ST, still feels out of place for me. I mean, granted, I was not keen on transitioning to family life with a pedestrian option like a minivan or boring SUV. But I didn’t expect my always frugal—cost conscious—female counterpart to go along with it 100%. She was supposed to pump the brakes and did not. I’ve realized, in this, that every woman is happy with the nice things and won’t say no if you provide it for them. We’ve both agreed to blame the baby for our reckless financial decision.

So, back to Milton, a place I’ve since moved on from and to the higher cost town across the river. Up until the words from the mouth of this wholesome girl, I had thought having a little house completely paid off would be worth something—even attractive. After all she claimed to be interested in missionary service and what better place to get a start, right? From what I had believed, there are needs anywhere there are people and where better to start than a deteriorating industrial town? Milton is an example of the rust belt, a place of declining opportunities and costs of outsourcing production.

The phrase “you’re thirty years old living in Milton” was simply accurate conveyance of her underlying priorities. There’s always the difference between what we say we are and the actual truth. Even in the secular culture there’s a romanticization of the love of two impoverished people who stand together in desperate circumstances. And those raised in an environment where Christian mission is supposed to be first, living as one poor as a church mouse amongst common people would seem the ideal.

But it is not. No, this young woman, like the one who had rejected me for not pursuing a title of “missionary” or “pastor” years prior, was clearly after status. They will not say it outright, probably are not even aware, but it is a kind of glamour they seek in service. A call to some exotic location to impress their religious peers. Sure, a Bentley may not be status in a conservative Anabaptist church, but the ability to jet around the world (often on someone else’s dime) is thrilling where it is considered sacrifice. It is currency, a way to gain status in a community of faith or be seen as righteous.

Resources are showered on the ministry or mission. Sure, it comes with stress, my 9-5 does as well, but the payoff is proportional. And not talking about “treasures in heaven” or God’s favor. A pastor has access to the community resources. It is social power as much as it is a position of responsibility and there are always those who want to curry a little favor. Again, it also comes with more scrutiny as well, but most tend to minimize the costs when they set off in a particular direction. Besides that, for the Mennonite woman, this is for the broad shoulders of her husband to bear, right?

The high expectations of my wife have been a little surprising to me. To her credit, she has been putting up with a partly finished remodel of old house since marrying and moving in. But yet, despite coming from the Philippines, her standards are now close to that of an American woman. We comment about our son’s demands for what the other kids have, but often fail the test ourselves. I mean, is it at all coincidence that I decide to finally pull the trigger on a new vehicle after a Mennonite workmate showed up with his new truck? Probably not.

And that’s the bottom line here. We are all after power in different forms. Be it money, be it land, access to resources or just status in our peer group. What I’ve found is that a religiously trained (or ‘spiritual’) person is no different. No, all they do is give a righteous cover to their personal ambition. They live in a delusion. Materialism is bad, they will say, but they are fine with your donation of money so they can buy a bigger missionary compound in Southeast Asia. And, under the fluff of my own pursuit of love was the same sexual motivation of all men.

I hated when a physiatrist summarized my obsession with the impossibility as being a “sexual attraction” and dismissed it initially as a woman who knew nothing of my heart as a man of God. But now I realized this is undoubtedly the correct assessment. Men want sexually attractive women and women want high status men. This is an essential part of our nature—a matter of survival for our genes—a young healthy woman is able to bear children and a wealthy or connected man can give them much more than a thirty year old living in Milton.

I’ve moved on from Milton, but cannot move on from the reality I have encountered head on, we’re sexual creatures living in material reality and can’t escape this by denial. I had been better to learn this decades ago rather than cling to a naive notion of love where it ends like a storybook. But I am now living the best life available to me and hope that my wife is happy with her decision. She’s won my heart asking for the “simple and happy life” and now I want to give her that and everything else wonderful this world offers. The best thing we gained was the child born almost a year ago now…

It’s never too late to live the life that you should—which is more about perspective than what you possess—even if you were denied love for being thirty years old and living in Milton.

MAGA Betrayed: A Full Court Press to Silence the Free Press 

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A month or two ago a family member sent me a video of Steven Crowder going on the attack against an Orthodox Christian nun in Palestine. Mother Agapia Stephanopoulos was hosted by Tucker Carlson and talked to him about the violence against indigenous Christians in the occupied West Bank. And very soon after this interview, Crowder, who supposedly represents conservative values, went on the offensive claiming to “debunk” a faithful woman who has dedicated her life to what is remaining of Christian legacy in the Holy Lands.

Crowder, an Evangeli-con social media grifter, being so totally vicious about this woman’s physical appearance in his opening salvo made me wonder about his motives. What is it to him that she was sharing her experience? So I followed the money and found the reason. Crowder has a few notable sponsors, one of them called “Express VPN” and if you dig a little deeper this originates from a developer that goes by Kape Technologies.

Who owns that?

A guy named Teddy Sagi—an Israeli billionaire with an unscrupulous record.

So one has to wonder, is the sponsorship about selling the service or is it a way to buy influence? A bit of both, perhaps?

Temu Charlie Kirk

Either way, Crowder is getting paid to represent a certain perspective and likely got a memo: “We need you to do a hit job on that Orthodox nun, this is your list of talking points about her from our guys in intelligence. We will talk more about our ad budget for next year if you can get 100k clicks.” That’s my own crude caricature, but we know that Sagi is getting something in return for his investment and a VPN makes a nice front company to pay for propaganda. They also make a nice way to access your personal data—a specialty of Israeli-sourced ‘security’ software.

Here’s a brief overview by Grok:

Kape Technologies, a UK-based cybersecurity conglomerate specializing in privacy tools like VPNs, was originally founded in 2011 as Crossrider, a company notorious for developing ad injection software that was frequently bundled with malware, enabling intrusive tracking and data harvesting on users’ devices—a practice that continued plaguing the web as late as 2019. Rebranded to Kape in 2018 amid efforts to pivot toward “ethical” digital security, it aggressively acquired major VPN providers to dominate the market: CyberGhost in 2017 for $10.4 million, Private Internet Access (PIA) in 2019 for $95 million, ZenMate, and notably ExpressVPN in 2021 for $936 million, now controlling about 40% of the top VPN services alongside affiliate review sites that suspiciously rank its own products highest. The company is fully owned by Unikmind Holdings, a shell entity controlled by Israeli billionaire Teddy Sagi—a convicted fraudster from a 1990s insider trading scandal, Playtech gambling software founder, and major donor to the Israeli Defense Forces—who bought out remaining shares in 2024, privatizing Kape and reducing transparency by delisting it from the London Stock Exchange, followed by layoffs of around 180 employees (12% of staff) in early 2025 amid whispers of restructuring. This history raises serious potential risks for users seeking true privacy: from backdoors or data-sharing compelled by Israeli intelligence ties (Sagi and co-founder Koby Menachemi hail from elite Unit 8200 spy unit, echoing Pegasus spyware scandals), to conflicts of interest where “privacy” tools could flip to surveillance, especially given Kape’s opaque operations and the irony of a former malware peddler now gatekeeping global internet anonymity.

Things are not what they appear. Look up Pegasus and Paragon. If it says security it is probably about backdoor access to your personal information. But, of course, you’re supposed to be afraid of Chinese ownership of TikTok. Anyhow, as the expression goes—every accusation is a confession. If they say it is about your security it is really only about their ability to maintain control over the flow of information and to manufacture consent for their policies. The fox is now guarding the henhouse.

Weaponization of Social Media

After the assassination of Charlie Kirk there has been a full-court press to ‘weaponize’ social media on behalf of Israel. This isn’t my choice of words. This comes from the mouth of one foreign leader who is always allowed unusual access to US politics and that is Benjamin Netanyahu:

Social media is the most important weapon Israel has at its disposal. […] Now, if we can get those two things [TikTok under U.S. control and X access], we can get a lot, and I can go on about other things, but that’s not the point right now.

Oh, so remember that bipartisan campaign to ban TikTok, supposedly over the concern that the Chinese wanted to spy on our kids, which started right after Israel started their bombing of Gaza and killing of journalists? Well, the real reason for this should now be clear: Hasbara doesn’t work when those not already brainwashed and indoctrinated can see the truth in a thousand images. TikTok bypassed the censorship regime.

And let’s not pretend we do not know what that is. After Covid we all know how there was enormous pressure put on our social media platforms to protect the government narrative. Mark Zuckerberg recently went on Joe Rogan to tell how Facebook was forced to suppress truth, under the Biden administration, he likened the fact-check process to being “something out of 1984.”  If you recall, people got banned for saying the virus may have originated in lab in China—when now this is being accepted a plausible theory of the origin.

The same people who would scoff at “China virus” being racist are okay “free Palestine” being labeled as anti-Semetic.

So when TikTok was forced into selling and has hired Erica Mindel, a former IDF soldier, to run their new “Public Policy Manager for Hate Speech” position—do you think she will be there as a neutral arbiter and ban the use of the word “terrorist” describe the children in Gaza? Not a chance. No, it is her job to censor information behalf of the site’s new owners, including the Zionist Trump-backer billionaire Larry Ellison, and their aim being anything on the platform that could hurt the Gaza real estate deal or can be interpreted as pro-Palestinian.

The War Against Free Speech

Why this full-court press? The US is Israel’s most vital resource and is exploited to the tune of billions annually in direct aid. And that’s just the start. Wars in Iraq and Syria, which did not benefit average Americans in any way shape or form, cost us trillions and that is not to mention the young men killed or broken for life—like those two rampaging Marine veterans over the weekend.

With their once reliable Boomer vein dying off and younger generations seeing through their propaganda. The Zionists, to fully tap into our human and industrial resources, must first strip away the resistance. This is not left to chance. No, they buy support of influencers. The dangle incentives in front of young rising stars online, bring them on a trip to Israel and the then will sponsor their content through shell companies. Once you are hooked on their money they own you, all you need to do is sprinkle in a little of their propaganda and the checks keep coming—and if you deviate too far from script?

US influencers partying it up, on a paid trip to Israel, while Palestinians die

Well, Charlie Kirk was doing a lot of talking about this before his untimely death:

I have less ability… to criticize the Israeli government than actual Israelis do. And that’s really, really weird. I’m terrified of stepping on a minefield here, trying to please both my owners [donors] and my audience.

(Charlie Kirk, The Megyn Kelly Show, Episode 832, August 6, 2025)

Yes, Kirk had been a stalwart Zionist, just as many in the Evangeli-con fundamentalist camp are, but recently had begun to openly express his doubts, questioning the October 7th narrative and suggesting that there was a stand down order given that had allowed to happen, and he even started to platform conservatives who see Gaza as a genocide or don’t want our tax dollars used to bomb babies. Kirk was loudly opposed to Trump getting involved in Netanyahu’s war against Iran. And was called on the carpet—by his billionaire owners—for his defiant show of independence.

The Unforgivable Disloyalty

Trump and Kirk have the same billionaires bankrolling them. Miriam Adelson, born in Mandatory Palestine and widow of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, gave the Trump campaign $100 million dollars. This might be why he is backing up her Maccabee Task Force (MTF) in his crackdown on speech on college campuses. Her MTF doesn’t just counter the criticism of Israel—it obliterates it, slandering pro-Palestinian students and faculty as “Hamas supporters” or as being “Jew haters.” It is basically cancel culture on steroids.

A billionaire’s club.

With $100 million in lobbying muscle, MTF deploys doxxing campaigns, and pressures universities to discipline activists, pushes “(re)educational” programs that whitewash Israel’s actions. At Columbia U, Adelson’s MTF helped fuel Trump’s calls to deport student protesters like Mahmoud Khalil. This is not advocacy. No, it us a speech cartel, ensuring that no Gaza encampment or divestment call will threaten the billions funneled to Israel’s war machine. Adelson’s checks don’t just buy Trump’s loyalty—they buy campus silence, turning campuses into censored zones where dissent is punished and truth is the enemy.

Trump marketed MAGA to those weary of war, proclaiming America First as his motto—absolute opposition to foreign aid and DEI favoritism. But, like the scene from George Orwell’s Animal Farm, when the ruling pigs change the egalitarian commandment “All animals are equal” (adding to it “but some animals are more equal than others.”) we’ve found there is always one exception to this and that is on behalf of those who paid for his campaign. With President Trump it is America First—Israel Firster.

Trump’s betrayal goes beyond this directed attack on free speech. It’s also about family gain. Enter Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and Middle East “peace” envoy, who had brokered the Abraham Accords, not as a genuine diplomatic win, but as a sweetheart real estate deal for his own firm. Kushner’s Affinity Partners hedge fund scooped up $2 billion from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund mere months after leaving the White House—blood money that was funneled through UAE backchannels, with zero U.S. oversight. And let’s not forget his now infamous Gaza proposal: turning the rubble-strewn devastated Strip into a “waterfront property” paradise for wealthy Gulf investors, complete with luxury condos atop the mass graves. It’s not policy; it’s a flip: Kushner as the fixer—turning Palestinian suffering into billionaire beachfront.

And none of this is good for the American people who are already footing the bill for the demolition of Gaza.

Property of Israel—Till Death?

Once one truly understands the extent of the influence of this foreign lobby, and how much it has cost us in terms of cash, lives and reputation in the world, there is never a return to politics as usual. Trump has not ended cancel culture, foreign aid, forever war or drained the swamp. No, AIPAC and a slew of billionaires tied to Israel are calling the shots, along with Netanyahu, and—while they plan the next big war on behalf of a few elites and Israel—the shelves are bare for wounded warriors of the last one.

The world leader on cancel culture is waited on by his faithful servant.

Charlie Kirk, like his friend Candice Owens, like Tucker Carlson, and Elon Musk, seemed to have increasing awareness of this sordid reality—where we got the same policies no matter who we voted for. Unfortunately he was never given the chance to put together everything that is laid out above. Whether he was killed by a crazed trans leftist or the same big money that made Turning Point a political force on a national level we’ll likely never know, but we do know that he wasn’t just some paid shill reading off a script.

Apparently the desperate Zionist regime is now paying American influencers $7000 for every post the make to help hide the crimes of Gaza. And the deeper you dig the more disturbing it gets. They fear-monger about TikTok somehow being a platform for CCP spying and then hand it over to the control of a foreign country with one scandal after another involving surveillance of unwitting users of their software. This is affront to MAGA and the American values that those on the right-wing claimed to defend during the Covid shutdowns—we must not let the powerful monopolize the conversation.

This is free speech and should not be punished.

The war on free speech—whether through Crowder’s bought-and-paid-for smears, Adelson’s campus crackdowns, or TikTok’s censorship under Ellison’s ex-IDF enforcers—is a desperate bid to shield a grotesque truth: Trump and Kushner’s betrayal of MAGA’s anti-war ethos for a Gaza land grab, funded by Adelson’s millions and Saudi blood money, turns Palestinian suffering into profit. But Gen Z’s unfiltered posts and campus rebellions are cracking the Hasbara facade, exposing the bombs, the condos, and the lies. Reject their tech fronts, defy their censors, and amplify the raw truth—on social media, in the streets, everywhere. America’s soul isn’t for sale; reclaim our Constitutional birthright by speaking out, or let the billionaires’ war on dissent silence us all.

Morality as a Fluid Mess: Conditioning, Conflict, and the Mirage of Universality

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We cling to morality like it’s a lighthouse in the fog—steady, universal, guiding us home. But it’s a lie. It’s a battered flag, flapping in whatever wind our tribe’s blowing, stitched from the yarns we’re spun by family, faith, or flag. Raised Mennonite, I drank in peace and love for the outsider as if they were carved in my bones—until I saw they weren’t. Nature doesn’t whisper “thou shalt not kill”; it shrugs while we slit throats or swipe bread when the need hits. History’s littered with it: Biblical Israel butchered Canaanites—whole towns, babies dashed on rocks—‘cause God handed them the deed (Deuteronomy 7:1-2), and the faithful sang psalms over the ashes. 

Fast-forward to 2025: Israel pounds Gaza, kids buried in rubble, and the justification’s “security”—Hamas tunnels, rockets, survival. Insiders nod; it’s moral, necessary. Morality’s no fixed star—it’s a mirror, reflecting who we’re with and what we want.Look around today, and it’s the same mess. Russia rolls tanks into Ukraine, March 2025 still grinding on, flattening Mariupol redux—schools, hospitals, grandmas in the crosshairs. Putin’s line: “denazification,” protecting Russian speakers, historical destiny. His people buy it, or enough do—state TV’s been marinating them in it for years. The West screams “war crimes!”—sanctions pile up, Zelensky’s a saint on X—but that’s the outsider’s perch. Kyiv’s got its own blood on the slate: shelling Donbas for a decade, shrugging at Russian-speaking dead. Both sides sanctify their kills; morality bends to the banner. Or take the U.S.: Trump loyalists storm Capitol Hill in ‘21, “stolen election!” on their lips, while Biden’s crew locks ‘em up, crowing “democracy!” Same act—violence for a cause—flips from treason to justice depending on the lens. It’s not universal; it’s us-versus-them, conditioned to the core.

Look around today, and it’s the same mess. Russia rolls tanks into Ukraine, March 2025 still grinding on, flattening Mariupol redux—schools, hospitals, grandmas in the crosshairs. Putin’s line: “denazification,” protecting Russian speakers, historical destiny. His people buy it, or enough do—state TV’s been marinating them in it for years. The West screams “war crimes!”—sanctions pile up, Zelensky’s a saint on X—but that’s the outsider’s perch. Kyiv’s got its own blood on the slate: shelling Donbas for a decade, shrugging at Russian-speaking dead. Both sides sanctify their kills; morality bends to the banner. Or take the U.S.: Trump loyalists storm Capitol Hill in ‘21, “stolen election!” on their lips, while Biden’s crew locks ‘em up, crowing “democracy!” Same act—violence for a cause—flips from treason to justice depending on the lens. It’s not universal; it’s us-versus-them, conditioned to the core.

Objections bubble up like clockwork. The optimists—call ‘em Pinker’s crowd (2011)—say genocide’s revulsion proves we’ve got a moral spine, empathy baked in from caveman days. Hunter-gatherers shared meat, Confucius preached kindness—see, we’re wired for good! But that’s a half-truth, and a flimsy one. Those old tribes cared for their own; strangers got the club. Same with today’s wars: Ukraine’s defenders weep for Bucha’s mass graves but gloss over their own artillery sins. Israel’s critics howl at Gaza’s death toll—over 40,000 by late 2024, per UN counts—yet Hamas rockets barely dent their outrage. Why? Fundamental attribution error: outsiders slap “evil” on the doer—Russia’s a monster, Israel’s a bully—while ignoring the stew they’re boiling in: encirclement fears, decades of tit-for-tat bombs. Insiders don’t see villainy; they see survival, righteousness, their conditioning kicking in. Evolution’s no saint—it’ll cheer cooperation or carnage, whichever keeps the clan breathing.

Objections bubble up like clockwork. The optimists—call ‘em Pinker’s crowd (2011)—say genocide’s revulsion proves we’ve got a moral spine, empathy baked in from caveman days. Hunter-gatherers shared meat, Confucius preached kindness—see, we’re wired for good! But that’s a half-truth, and a flimsy one. Those old tribes cared for their own; strangers got the club. Same with today’s wars: Ukraine’s defenders weep for Bucha’s mass graves but gloss over their own artillery sins. Israel’s critics howl at Gaza’s death toll—over 40,000 by late 2024, per UN counts—yet Hamas rockets barely dent their outrage. Why? Fundamental attribution error: outsiders slap “evil” on the doer—Russia’s a monster, Israel’s a bully—while ignoring the stew they’re boiling in: encirclement fears, decades of tit-for-tat bombs. Insiders don’t see villainy; they see survival, righteousness, their conditioning kicking in. Evolution’s no saint—it’ll cheer cooperation or carnage, whichever keeps the clan breathing.

Zoom out, and the pattern’s stark. Morality’s a tool, not a truth—always has been. Libertarians’ll shoot to guard their patch, Marxists’ll guillotine for the proletariat, U.S. elites’ll drone-strike weddings to keep oil flowing—all cloaked in principle, all serving their pack. Russia’s “special operation” is Ukraine’s genocide; Israel’s “self-defense” is Palestine’s ethnic cleansing. The outsider’s gasp—those viral X posts of Kyiv’s ruins or Rafah’s craters—ain’t proof of a moral bedrock; it’s just a rival script, misreading situation as sin. We’re not debating ethics to polish some eternal gem; we’re wrestling over whose story rules. Take the Houthi strikes in Yemen, 2025 heating up: U.S. bombs “terrorists,” Saudis cheer, while aid workers tally starved kids—same act, split morals. Conditioning calls the shots.

The rebuttal’s got one last kick: if morality’s so fluid, why bother refining it? They say it’s progress, not just haggling—reason taming our beastly side. But that’s wishful polish on a cracked hull. Ukraine’s Zelensky begs for NATO jets, Israel’s Netanyahu quotes scripture for settlers, Trumpers and progressives sling “fascist” like mud—reason’s just a megaphone for the tribe. Authenticity’s the only anchor: own the bias, ditch the sanctimonious dance. Russia’s generals don’t lose sleep over Bucha; Israel’s brass don’t flinch at Gaza’s toll—they’ve got their why, and it’s enough. Outsiders clutch pearls—#WarCrimes trending—because they’re not in the fight. Morality’s a fluid mess, shifting with the players, not a lighthouse. Stop pretending it’s more.

Stepping back from the fray—whether it’s Putin’s moves in Ukraine or Hamas’s salvos from Gaza—offers an authenticity that sidesteps the knee-jerk noise and stares down our own fundamental attribution error. Take Putin: some tag him as a ruthless tyrant, others see a strategist pushing back—NATO’s ring of bases and war games from Poland to the Baltics isn’t exactly a welcome mat, but Russia’s leveling cities isn’t a handshake either. Hamas gets the same split: outsiders call them terrorists, yet in Gaza—two million penned in, scrappy and stubborn—they’re fighting a chokehold, though rockets don’t win halos. My Mennonite roots nudge me to judge NATO’s chest-thumping ‘values’ or Hamas’s bloodshed, but I’ve got my own baggage—my folks kept the world at arm’s length too, just with hymns, not guns. Seeing that, owning how my lens twists the view, points a pragmatic way forward: not crowning heroes or villains, but cutting through the sanctimony—NATO’s not spotless, Gazans aren’t pawns, and I’m no referee, just a guy sorting his own slant in the mess.

And Jesus Had Compassion…

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I’ve frequently been appalled and dismayed by the things I see coming from my former religious peers.  It is very well-meaning, but so horribly misguided.  And recently I saw a post like that, and imagined an incredulous Jesus: “You are Israel’s teacher, and do you not understand these things?”

*sigh*

What I’m talking about is the intellectuals of the conservative Mennonite cloister, those who teach the Gospel of Niceness and side with Judas and Social Justice who confuse Jesus with a political figure who is seeking to install a Marxist regime.  They ride on the leftist bandwagon, believing it makes them countercultural—when they’re simply going along with the powerful elites of our time.  Hypocritical elites who have mandates for us and exceptions for themselves.

The offending post was one of such glaring false equivalency that I can hardly fathom a thinking person would come up with it.  The misleading commentary is that Elon Musk resharing a meme in support of his efforts to remove waste, fraud, and abuse from the government is the same as Hillary Clinton applying a nasty label to those who dared to vote against her.  This is the statement:

Clinton called millions of ordinary Americans a “basket of deplorables.” 

Musk called millions of ordinary Americans “the Parasite Class.” 

When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (Matthew 9:36)

First of all, the first part is true, Clinton did indeed call ordinary Americans a “basket of deplorables” saying that half of those who were voting against her were “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic.”  It is to say that over thirty-one million people who got tired of the glib “We came, we saw, he died” imperial-lib establishment that she represents are just horrible people.  

Not only is she punching down, attacking a bunch of ordinary people for voting against her, but the reason she is demonizing then is to terrify vulnerable people.  It is a cynical divide and conquer strategy, purely for sake of securing political power for herself, and part of a campaign to turn Trump’s simple effective “Make America Great Again” into something divisive and scary rather than an inclusive unifying message.

Elon Musk, by contrast, merely reshared a post.  He did not say half of the Democrat party support is parasites.  What he did say is “90% of America loves @DOGE.”  In other words, he is speaking for the crowd rather than against it.  Furthermore, the meme is not about legitimate social programs and those who benefit.  Nobody in the Trump administration is calling for slashing the rightful entitlements of Social Security or Medicare and Medicaid.

Name calling!  Accusing elites of exploitation!  Jesus would never do that, right?

What DOGE has taken aim at is the totally ridiculous and absurd, obviously fraudulent use of public funds, which 90% of America (if properly informed) supports.  The ‘crowd’ would be fully on Musk’s side if they weren’t being lied to or blinded by partisan bias.  It is compassion for those truly “harassed and helpless” that is drives the effort to increase government efficiency—and the social elites who willfully take advantage of taxpayers should be called out.

To those doing apologetics for waste, fraud and abuse, who are pushing this dishonesty take and misrepresentation: I would find it so much more tolerable if it was a forthright endorsement of sending money for far-left causes.  Just come out with it and say that you want money funnelled through USAID to pay for global promotion of transgenderism and pro-imperialist propaganda—you want this, be honest.

Compassion for the Brood of Vipers?

“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?” (Matthew 23:33 NIV)

Jesus had compassion for the crowds, but he spoke very condemningly of social elites who used their positions of influence to put heavy burdens on the shoulders of others—while not offering a finger to help.  

Jesus pretty much describes the telescopic philanthropy, the virtue-signaling and pearl-clutching of modern social justice.  

Jesus did not show compassion for these moralizing frauds.

Nice Jesus is upset about mean Tweets calling out social elites.  Real Jesus was killed because he wouldn’t stop insulting the people who thought they were above the ‘deplorable’ unwashed crowds.  Nice Jesus only would affirm and accepts everyone without ever requiring a change.  Real Jesus once compelled a tax collector (and cheat) to give back his ill-gotten gains—he greeted the promise of restoration by pronouncing salvation had come to this house.

If Jesus walked the streets of Manhattan today he would be accused of being very meanspirited, labeled as hateful, and likely cancelled by the woke elites.  They would whip up the crowd by taking things he said out of context, by calling him a homophobe, sexist or racist.  After all, he used the word “dog” to describe a foreign woman.  That is what the critics of Jesus did, he called them out and they false accused him.  He would most certainly be diagnosed as being a cult leader and narcissist for his claims.

Not saying a pair of trolling billionaires are the same as Jesus.  But they certainly do take after the character of that man who was overturning the tables of the money changers and chasing out of the temple.  Lest we forget, the money changers were those who took advantage of the poor who were obligated to pay the tax.  This money was supposed to go to the upkeep of the temple and yet teams of grifters, offering a service, were being parasites:

Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. “It is written,” he said to them, “ ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’” (Matthew 21:12-13 NIV)

The Gospels contain differing accounts of this event, some scholars believe it may be about two separate times when Jesus went charging in on a little ‘insurrection’ rampage, but interestingly his explanation of authority to do this cleansing was later misconstrued and used at his trial.  

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

The corporate media has taken fabricated tales and normal diplomacy with a foreign power—and they spun it into an incredible “Russian collusion” narrative.  Trump talked about the “very fine people” on both sides of the Charlottesville statue controversy, and he took great pains to qualify his statement—by very specifically condemning the white nationalists and Nazis in the crowd.  But it didn’t stop the media from running the story “Trump Calls Nazis ‘Fine People'” and Joe Biden, along with many other Democrat partisans, have continued to repeat this lie.

Where Trump, and MAGA, clearly delineate between legal and illegal immigration, their detractors muddy the waters.  The left takes Trump’s desire to keep America safe from the flow of Fentanyl and of unvetted foreign nationals and twists it into xenophobia and a threat to legal immigration.  It is deliberate deception.  The far-left wants to keep brown and black people terrified that’s how they’ve always won—by fear-mongering the crowd, they deceive the sheep and, when that does not work, they will imprison or assassinate their opponents.

Remember ‘kindness is everything’ my leftist friends, right?

Evil doesn’t like to have a light shown on it and when you see all of the screeching in response to DOGE taking a look behind the walls of bureaucracy you do really start to wonder why.  Why are they treating Musk as if he’s just some Nigerian scammer trying to get our information?  Is it because he’s from Africa?  It is totally ridiculous.  Lawmakers circle the wagons and tell us we have no right to know how our money is spent!  It’s time to drive out those who have used us to enrich themselves.

There is always a spy versus spy aspect to this where accusation is met with a recrimination.  Both Jesus and those elites questioning his authority claimed that their counterpart was demon possessed or of the Devil.  It would require some wisdom and discernment to know which of the two sides to believe.  But the religious frauds of our day still side with the elites against the crowd.  They defend the status quo and the corrupted established system.  It is always the beneficiaries of fraud that fight against the reform.

Love Is Patriarchal

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As I ponder my responsibilities, bringing a daughter into this world, my patriarchal protection is a given.

The West has been so successful at privileging women that many women do not comprehend the risks of true equal treatment. Feminism is only possible as a part of the patriarchal duty that men feel to protect women. What it amounts to is using male power to enforce standards that are friendly to women, that allow them to walk freely in the street in all manner of dress (or undress), and ignore the reality of what has existed outside the walls of patriarchalism.

Even the idea that sexual assault is a bad thing is an extension of patriarchalism where natural desire must be restrained by structures created by men. A buck in the rut doesn’t ask permission. Hormones direct it’s behavior and only the bigger male can ward off the advances it will make on a doe. It is a hierarchy that is built only on strength. Moral conscience is built off the idea that there’s a big man up there who cares about property rights; who says that a body belongs to someone and is therefore not ours for the taking simply because we desire it.

Yes, eventually this evolved into an idea of everyone owning themselves that we now assume is simply the universal truth. However, nothing in the animal kingdom suggests this is the case. The real world is often a brutal and unforgiving place. When a new group of male lions takes over a pride they will kill the cubs of the previous males. And human morality developed in a very similar manner. This was the default, whether the Psalmist’s fantasy about bashing the heads of an enemy’s infants against rocks or the book of Deuteronomy giving some rules for the treatment of war brides:

When you go to war against your enemies and the Lord your God hands them over to you and you take some of them prisoner, and if you see a beautiful woman among the captives, desire her, and want to take her as your wife, you are to bring her into your house. She is to shave her head, trim her nails, remove the clothes she was wearing when she was taken prisoner, live in your house, and mourn for her father and mother a full month. After that, you may have sexual relations with her and be her husband, and she will be your wife. Then if you are not satisfied with her, you are to let her go where she wants, but you must not sell her or treat her as merchandise, because you have humiliated her.

Deuteronomy 21:10-14

To our modern ears, this is horrendous. There is no asking for permission. And, other than saying to wait a month, the men were free to rape their captive females. But the reality is that this was a radical step in the direction of protecting women from physical violation. One hopes that this delay would’ve ensured a more compassionate and gentle approach rather than some blood-soaked orgy during the heat of battle and immediately after her male relatives were slaughtered. As grotesque as this seems, it was better for her to belong to one man (with some rights after he rejects her) than to be passed around as a mere sex object in the manner of a Japanese comfort woman:

CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) A Japanese soldier got his bayonet and started peeling my father’s skin while saying, tell us the truth – your child is part of the guerrillas with the owners of that empty house.

MCCARTHY: As Claveria pleaded to let her father go, a soldier wrenched her arm. Birdlike, petite, Claveria strokes a badly set bone as she picks up the story of how she followed her mother’s screams up the stairs.

CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) I saw my mother lying down with her skirt up, and there was a Japanese soldier on top of her. I ran. My two youngest siblings took little sticks and started hitting the soldiers. The Japanese soldiers then snatched away the sticks and bayoneted both of them.

MCCARTHY: They died. Claveria believes her parents were killed when the village was torched. Japanese soldiers hauled away two older sisters to a garrison and took Claveria to an infirmary for her injured arm. She does not recall how long she was there recovering, but she remembers a soldier named Terasaki. One day, he told Claveria she smelled, but she refused to take a bath, saying she had no change of clothes. Ordering her to wash, she says he gave her a uniform to put on.

CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) I was to be taken to the garrison where my two sisters were. Before we reached the garrison, he raped me. I thought that I was going to die because I was in so much pain.

MCCARTHY: Terasaki would be the first of many Japanese soldiers to sexually assault Claveria, who was not even a teenager at the time. She was 12. She said her sister Meteria had been driven half mad by the trauma she’d experienced at the garrison. Claveria was shocked when she caught sight of her there.

CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) She was burned with cigarette butts and boiled sweet potatoes. When one soldier after the next raped her, she put up a fight, but my sister was not brave. She refused because she was in so much agony from all the abuse.

MCCARTHY: Claveria believes her other kidnapped sister was moved to a different garrison. She was never seen again. Historians have estimated that at least 200,000 women were forced into sexual servitude during World War II, mostly in areas occupied by Japan, prominently Korea. The women were euphemistically called comfort women, and the organized system of comfort stations to supply soldiers sexual gratification ran from Seoul to Singapore. Writer Evelina Galang has documented women captured in the Philippines.

EVELINA GALANG: And these are women as young as 16 years old – really, some of them 8, 10 years old. In the Philippines, historians estimate that there were probably about a thousand women and girls taken and put into military sex slave camps.

Men can be monsters. Worse than animals. And, in many parts of the world, immodest dress is taken to be a sign she wants it. Morality does not hold back the aggression of the rapist. No, rather it is the role of other men to restrain evil. Women are protected by their fathers, by their husbands, and by institutions that represent these men. Political structures were created by men and are defended by men. Yes, even if women were granted the right to participate. E.g. even if Kamala Harris takes the patriarchal role—she is still acting in a patriarchal manner and will need the strength of men to impose her will.

There will not be a feminist left in Europe if Islamists take over. That is not to bash Islam or say they would kill off all women who did not submit. No, it is to say that feminism cannot exist outside of the Christian West. The notion of individual rights, that people can independently make their own decisions, cannot exist only on paper or it is impotent. It requires men willing to sacrifice themselves to preserve this egalitarian ideal for their wives and children. Self-sacrificial love is not natural nor a priority in every religious patriarchal structure. Feminists cannot exist in Islam because only the respect of patriarchal institutions gives them power.

The alternative to the current patriarchy is not the absence of patriarchy, men (or those who act like men) will always rule, but the real choice is what manner of rule we wish to live under. It really is survival of the fittest outside of the walls of civilization. Chants of “down with the patriarchy” are about as meaningless as shaking your fist at the wind. It misunderstands the world. It assumes that nature will simply obey our voice because we’re angry and believe rights can exist outside of the structures that guaranteed them for us. It is only in the absence of rule by men who care about more than their own sexual gratification that the value of this benevolent form of patriarchy is known.

The Unfairness Of Competition

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The other day I looked across the gym and saw a familiar grin. 

Oh, Ydran decided to pump iron! 

My son, still twelve years old, isn’t the most committed to strength training or conditioning and prefers to spend his time lounging at the pool.  But with Junior High football being right around the corner he (completely of his own volition) was putting some work in.  I gave a salute and then we both continued with our respective workouts.  

However, what really impressed me was the weight he had on the bar.  His bench is right around 100 lbs, for reps.  And this brought me back to when I started lifting weights.  I can recall doing the same weight, except in my Junior year of high school!  And also how some of the football players would curl my bench weight, as in literally take what I had on the rack and use it to curl.  But it was not totally embarrassing for me  I only weighed 112 lbs as a Senior.  It shows what a difference his genetics make.  With a bit of work ethic, he’ll be an athletic freak—while I never was going to be great.

As for myself since school? 

I’ve put on enough mass to make up for the sunken chest (which was a consequence of my traumatic birth) and am above average in terms of bench strength—even after being effectively reduced to zero twice due to my neck injury and having to rebuild.  With my current body weight around 180 lbs, I have recently broken a personal record with six solid reps of 225 lbs.  Which is more than most men will ever do and a result of discipline.  I was determined to overcome my limitations.

Still, given where he is now, with a little bit of effort and a few more years, he will do more than what I’ve ever done.  He’s just athletically gifted, has very good hand-eye coordination, and is already big and strong enough to give some serious competition.  It is only a matter of time until I won’t have any advantage.  Fair or not he will be better than me at everything he wants to do and probably with less overall struggle.  So long as he will remain healthy he is destined to crush me in any competition. 

There is no such thing as an even playing field in sports and competition.  If we were all built the same, with the same opportunities or abilities, every contest would end in a tie—there couldn’t be winners or losers.  But we do have differences in size, speed, endurance, and even in motivation and desire.  Some had parents who pushed them, gave them more opportunities, and made sure they had the best nutrition and coaching, and that’s what gave them their edge.

So what is fair or not fair?

PIAA vs Aliquippa vs Southern Columbia

Pennsylvania has some hard-nosed smash-mouth high school football.  In particular, the towns of the coal region have produced dominant players and programs.  The Red Tornados, of Mount Carmel, is the storied winningest team in the state (6th in the nation) with a total of 899 wins.  But, have taken a step back, it is their neighbors to the North that are setting records today, and that being the Tigers of Southern Columbia with six consecutive State Championships.

However, on the complete opposite side of the state, in a Pittsburgh suburb, they have another team with an incredible tradition of winning, the Aliquippa Quips.  

Southern and Aliquippa started in the class A, small school category, they’ve battled in the State Championship game and online it is clear there is some bad blood on the side of the Quips, being humiliated 49-14 in the final back in 2015.  But what has really been grinding their gears is that—as the result of new PIAA rules intended to help maintain a competitive balance—they’ve been bumped up multiple classifications (the Tigers only going up one) due to transfers and success in the post-season.

The same exact rules apply to both teams and yet have impacted the Quips more dramatically and this has led to cries of foul—and a big whataboutism.

Their player safety is the first reason they’ve argued.  Despite Aliquippa having walloped an undefeated Selinsgrove Seals team, in the AAAA championship, earning them their latest bump in classification, and despite their having a roster with quite a bit of D1-destined talent for a typical small school—the Quips’ loyal fan base has been viciously accusing the PIAA organization of favoritism and their cross-state rivals of being a cheater for avoiding reclassification.  But there is zero evidence for either charge.  It seems that the reality, under all this bluster about player safety or fairness, is that they want to keep beating on a weaker field year after year.

They’ve taken it to court and have won their first appeal.  But the PIAA is fighting against this decision with their own appeal and who knows where it will go.  What I do know is it will likely be a matter of prejudice, not merit or metric, that decides the case.  

Racial overtones hang over this, as well as the fact that this is East versus West, the Tigers with their rural population while the Quips come from an urban community.  Southern Columbia sits in a cornfield, near the beautiful Knoebels amusement park and resort, representing a vibrant community of Elysburg and on the edge of the economically depressed coal region.  While jobs and a better place to live is a big enough draw—there is very little doubt that a few parents do move into the school district only for the sake of their child’s athletic future.  However, being on the edge of a big city like Pittsburgh is a massive advantage for Aliquippa.

There is talk now of a new “Southern Columbia rule” which effectively will target the Tigers specifically for their unprecedented success within the current regime.  Is it sour grapes or retaliatory rules?  Who knows.  But both of these powerhouses insist that the work they put in is what makes the difference. It is true to an extent.  The Tigers, under the tutelage of Jim Roth, went from basement dwelling to the point of nearly eliminating the football team to totally mauling their local schedule and stacking up trophies for decades—coaching with discipline got the ball rolling before it became a dynasty that creates its own weather.

But the sore losers do have a point, talent does gravitate towards Southern like bees to honey.  One example is that outstanding quarterback prospect from my hometown who ended up there, with rumors swirling that his dad rented an apartment in Elysburg so he could play and that this kid (who ended up going to Alabama) was still spending most of his time away from Tiger territory.  And yet, with the very high level of scrutiny the program has faced I am fairly certain all is done within the rules.

The point is that there is no perfect formula and thus never a fair competition.  Yes, they all need to suit the same amount of players to play, scoring rules should apply equally to all teams, and officials should have no bias, but there are a myriad of factors that can’t be controlled or properly accounted for.  No two communities in the state of Pennsylvania are exactly the same, some schools are advantaged in ways that others are not, so there will never be a perfect competitive balance.

Olympic Women vs Algerian Boxer

The trans controversy has taken yet another turn as a female Italian boxer, after only 46 seconds, collapsed in tears and she quit the bout.  The reason for this is that blows from her opponent, an Algerian, Imane Khelif—a “biological male” according to the blazing headlines—were too much to take.  And true enough, Khelif looks like a dude and had also previously been disqualified from international competitions due to having an XY chromosome.

An Italian woman takes a beating from Algerian.

My initial knee-jerk reaction was outrage.  It was wrong that this woman would have to face this obviously masculine figure.  And yet, when I started to dig, it turns out the “That’s a man!” reaction is a little bit of an oversimplification.  Khelif has always identified as a woman.  And that is because ‘she’ was assigned to the female category at birth.  Why?  Well, it’s because, no fault of anyone, they were born without the male organ.  They are one of those very rare cases of being intersex.  In other words, the ‘down there’ expression doesn’t match the chromosomal gender rule.

So the “Well Ackshully” mid-wits, armed with this little knowledge, proudly noting that Algeria (Muslim) is a conservative country, dunked on their dimwitted counterparts who saw what they saw.  They’re right in that Khelif is officially female because of ‘her’ female genitals.  But the weird part is how these same people who believe stuff like “misgendered” despite male anatomy suddenly can’t see the controversy when this competitor is also chromosomally a male and they’ve visibly benefitted from male hormones.  The real question is whether or not it is fair they’re allowed to be in the female category so far as boxing is concerned, not if they had been described as female on a birth certificate.

A controversial Taiwanese ‘female’ competitor.

The reason that there are two categories—one for men and another for women—it is a clear advantage to being a male when it comes to high-level competition.  Caitlin Clark, as phenomenal as she is against other women, wouldn’t make an NBA roster.  That’s not at all sexist, it is just reality in the same way I won’t post up with LeBron James.  And to deny this is on par with Flat-Earthism, they can say gender is a social construct (some of the expression is cultural), and yet there’s also overwhelming hard evidence that men have a distinct physical advantage, according to The Trans Athlete Debate “Dilemma”:

Even before puberty, when the differences effectuated by the influence of sex hormones sets in, from a purely genetic perspective, biological males are significantly advantaged.

Case in point, one study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine extensively researched peer-reviewed studies on the health-related fitness data of 85,000 Australian children aged 9-17.  It found that when “compared with 9-year-old females, 9-year-old males were faster over short sprints (9.8%) and 1 mile (16.6%), could jump 9.5% further from a standing start (a test of explosive power), could complete 33% more push-ups in 30 seconds and had 13.8% stronger grip.”

Another study of Greek children, published in the European Journal of Sports Science compared 6-year-old females and 6-year-old.  Researchers found that the “boys completed 16.6% more shuttle runs in a given time and could jump 9.7% further from a standing position. In terms of aerobic capacity, 6- to 7-year-old boys showed a higher absolute and relative (to body mass) VO2max than 6- to 7-year-old females”

If this weren’t the case, if women were equal to men, why not eliminate classification based on gender and let the best athletes of every country—male or female—compete for one gold medal in each event?

No, the reality is, if women had to compete with men, no woman would ever get to the Olympics—let alone stand on the podium. 

It has little to do with work ethic or desire.

There is no point even having a separate female category if some with an XY chromosome and higher levels of testosterone are allowed in the competition.   While athletic competition has roots in male versus male combat—I am not right-wing and want my daughter to have the opportunity to participate in sports.  I believe there needs to be a return to rationality, fairness, and safe competition. 

Khelif doesn’t belong in a ring against a normal woman any more than I do.  Get real.

High-level Competition Is Not a Right 

The progressive left has got all tied up in a knot over the idea that the difference between genders is a myth—merely a social construct. 

It is a feminist fantasy that a woman is capable of everything a man can do and that the only reason women are not equally represented is because of injustice. 

We hear complaints all of the time from female athletes who believe they deserve equal pay to men who a) produce far more revenue given they are the very best competitors and b) would no doubt humiliate any female challenger.

Note, for the purpose of this discussion, I’m talking only about athletic events, not about intellectual or other capabilities.  The other differences in ability based on gender can be a topic for another day, women have distinct advantages and superior abilities in other areas.  But my commentary here is strictly about physical strength, speed, and size—where men are gifted. 

Also, my wife and I are equally valuable to each other and the family, she works as hard as I do (or harder) and both of us play important roles in our home and the local community, and yet this doesn’t change the fact I could physically dominate her—or that even her own twelve-year-old son is taller and heavier than she is.

Truly, if I completed in the female category of power-lifting I would have elite strength and a chance for gold—as a slightly above-average male weight-lifter.

If it is a right to be an elite athlete, and if all women deserve a special category so they can have a chance to be recognized, is it fair that short and unathletic men are not represented?  Should we keep expanding professional leagues so that all can be champions?  Or is the point of these kinds of events to have only the best reach the top for the entertainment of those of us who know that we don’t belong there?

Female athletes, instead of griping about unequal pay, should be grateful that they are privileged with a second-tier category that has given women an opportunity to compete. 

No two people are equal.  There is no such thing as a fair competition.  But if there is a category for females, to accommodate their biological differences from men, then those with a clear competitive advantage because of male hormones or chromosomes should be excluded and how they identify or what is down there doesn’t matter.  Sure, the right gets things wrong for not understanding that exceptions do exist, but the left does worse and fails to comprehend that women need protection from those who are physically bigger and stronger.  The entire reason for separate categories for men and women is to protect women.

This is why we need to have criteria that go beyond the “identifies as a woman” leftist minimum. We need a standard that also considers the level of testosterone or chromosomal pairs.  If those who have very rare intersex characteristics don’t have a huge advantage, then how did two of them beat the odds to end up in the Olympics? Why even have a women’s division at all?  This is about fairness for all competitors, not about one individual.  Our participation in a competition is a privilege, not a right, and can’t be granted to all or it becomes worthless.  In the end, it is always a little arbitrary who is allowed or disallowed.