Category: Commentary

Commentary: Biden Staffer Who Mishandled China, Iran Secrets Retains High-Security Pentagon Job

RealClearWire

While Special Counsel Robert K. Hur has raised the issue of mental deterioration in explaining why he declined to prosecute 81-year-old Joe Biden for illegal retention and sharing of classified documents, the president chose another rationale to declare himself not culpable: He shifted the blame to the staffers who boxed up his records as he left the vice president’s office in 2017.

At a press conference hastily assembled after the report’s release, Biden said he assumed his aides had shipped “all” the documents to the National Archives in College Park, Md. “I wish I had paid more attention to how the documents were being moved and where,” he said. “I thought they were being moved to the Archives. I thought all of it was being moved [there].”

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Commentary: The 14th Amendment and the Bill of Rights Require Overturning the Colorado Decision

Virginia Star Staff
Trump SCOTUS

There are many reasons why the United States Supreme Court must overturn the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision holding that former President Trump is barred from the presidential ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which purports to prohibit a person who has engaged in “insurrection” from holding office.

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Commentary: Democrats are Hitting the Panic Button over Biden’s Mental Fitness

Virginia Star Staff
Joe Biden

In 1979, when President Jimmy Carter delivered his infamous “malaise” speech in which he laid out all the daunting challenges facing our nation, the president said that America was suffering from a “crisis of confidence.”

Fast-forward 45 years and our country is once again facing a crisis of confidence, this time under the failed leadership of President Joe Biden.

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Commentary: The Establishment Still Doesn’t Get Trump

RealClearWire
Trump Speaking

A few weeks ago, a “Morning Joe” panel concluded that if Donald Trump were to become the Republican nominee (spoiler alert: he will), Republicans will lose in the fall. This is by no means a unique sentiment – former House Speaker Paul Ryan expressing this idea here, journalist Bernard Goldberg wondering if Trump is trying to lose here, and so forth.

As I read these analyses, I wonder if I’ve somehow been transported back to 2016, when such takes were de rigueur. Here in 2024, we know that Donald Trump won in 2016 and came close to winning in 2020. He carried Republican senators across the finish line in both years, and the GOP gained House seats in 2020, much to the surprise of most election analysts. And, at a comparable time in the campaign cycle when he trailed Hillary Clinton by 4.5 points in the RCP Average and Joe Biden by 5.6 points, Trump actually leads Biden by 1.9 points in national polling.

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Commentary: Why Are Fewer Americans Celebrating Valentine’s Day?

Virginia Star Staff
Valentine's Day

Fewer Americans are planning to celebrate Valentine’s Day in 2024 than in years past.

America isn’t totally losing its love for the saccharine holiday, though. In fact, spending on Valentine’s Day gifts—for everyone from a significant other to one’s cat—has increased.

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Commentary: Medicine Now Diagnoses the Non-White ‘Oppressed’ with an Oppressive Case of ‘Weathering’

RealClearWire
Doctor Patient

In 1986, an upstart public health researcher named Arline Geronimus challenged the conventional wisdom that condemned the alarming rise of inner-city teen pregnancies. While activist minister Jesse Jackson and health care leaders were decrying the crisis of “babies having babies” as a ghetto pathology, Geronimus contended that teenage pregnancy was a rational response to urban poverty where low-income black people have fewer healthy years before the onset of heart problems, diabetes, and other chronic conditions.

Although Geronimus’ claims gained little traction at the time, the concept she pioneered – “weathering” – eventually became a foundation for the social justice ideology that is now upending medicine and social policy. She has stated in interviews and in her writings that the term “weathering” was intended to evoke the idea of erosion and resilience.

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Commentary: The Meaning of Ash Wednesday

Virginia Star Staff
Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday is—oddly perhaps—a day I have long associated with bushfires, better known in the American hemisphere as wildfires.

I come from the Adelaide Hills in South Australia, where on Ash Wednesday in 1983, catastrophic bushfires, driven by 70-mph winds and fueled by years of drought-ravaged eucalyptus forest, tragically claimed 28 lives. In the neighboring state of Victoria, even more lives were lost under similar conditions. In total, 75 Australians perished and 3,000 homes were destroyed in what were the nation’s deadliest bushfires up to that point.

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Victor Davis Hanson Commentary: Do Leftists Now Believe Leftism Doesn’t Work?

Virginia Star Staff

It is hard to destroy a naturally beautiful city like San Francisco, with ideal weather and stunning infrastructure inherited from far better earlier generations.

Yet San Francisco continues its much-publicized and self-inflicted doom loop. The productive classes still flee the increasingly crime-ridden city and its self-induced pathologies. The city is eroding not because of the doomsayers and not because of what people say about San Francisco, but because of what San Franciscans have done to San Francisco.

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Commentary: Alternatives to Wind and Solar Energy

Virginia Star Staff
Power plant

If the delusional but dead serious demands coming out of the international climate crisis community are to be believed, and as documented in the earlier two segments of this report, achieving universal energy security in the world will require wind energy capacity to increase by a factor of 60, while solar capacity increases by a factor of 100. The mix between wind and solar can vary, of course, but the required overall increase is indisputable. As noted in Part One of this report, that would be a very best-case scenario, where extraordinary improvements in energy efficiency meant that total energy production worldwide would only have to increase to 1,000 exajoules per year, from an estimated 600 exajoules in 2022.

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Commentary: Another Far-Left Progressive Admits the ‘Very Fine People’ Claim Was a Hoax All Along

Virginia Star Staff

Hard to Kill is a Steven Seagal action thriller from 1990 that garnered scornful reviews, though I loved it as a then-teenager. But that phrase, “hard to kill,” also aptly describes the “Very Fine People” hoax surrounding Charlottesville and the lingering myth that President Trump praised bigots there.

In recent days, liberal social media rabble-rouser actor Michael Rapaport stated on the Patrick Bet-David podcast that “the Charlottesville, that I ranted about, I was wrong… that there’s good people on both sides, and when you see the full quote, that wasn’t what he [Trump] said.” Rapaport has been a prolific Trump hater, producing vitriolic online rants that frequently go viral, earning him nearly 700,000 followers on X/Twitter.

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Commentary: Far from Environmentalists’ ‘Immoral’ Claim – We Need Children Now More than Ever

Virginia Star Staff
New Born Baby

In a recent television interview, environmental activist Donnachadh McCarthy informed the public that having more than two kids is selfish. McCarthy states in the interview that humanity has destroyed 70 percent of “nature” in one generation, presumably due to our so-called carbon footprint, although he doesn’t explain exactly how this has occurred.

“There’s a moral issue here,” he says. “How can we pass that on to the next generation? Every child in an industrial country like ours has around 505 hundred tonnes of carbon over their lifetime. That’s equivalent to 1000 years of electricity for a household. So each child has an impact, and we’re saying one is great, two is plenty, and three is selfish.”

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Commentary: Republicans Should Ally with the American People – Not Washington Democrats

RealClearWire
Congress Spending

No one should be surprised that conservatives are not supporting the U.S. Senate’s supposedly bipartisan border bill.

Every time Republicans reach out to Democrats to write a bipartisan bill, they inevitably sell out conservative values and accept liberal poison pills to get Democrats’ votes.

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Commentary: Special Counsel Hur Says Biden ‘Elderly Man with Poor Memory’

RealClearWire
Biden Meeting

The same week Joe Biden publicly confused two European leaders with their deceased predecessors and passed on the traditional softball Super Bowl Sunday interview, a new report from Special Counsel Robert Hur described the president as “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

The confluence of events raised further questions about the mental acuity of the 81-year-old executive, doubts that Biden did little to dispel in a defiant session with the press at the White House Thursday evening. Biden took particular umbrage with what he described as “extraneous commentary” contained in the report.

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Commentary: Good News for Trump, Bad News for Biden

Virginia Star Staff
Trump Biden White House

Three recent polls signal hope for Republicans and disaster for Democrats.

Democrats enjoyed a moment of optimism when Quinnipiac reported on a Jan. 25-26 survey that President Joe Biden was beating President Donald Trump 50 percent to 44 percent. There was a sudden wave of stories about a Biden comeback.

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Commentary: Avoid These Four Costly 401(k) Mistakes

Virginia Star Staff
Ford Stokes

As you near retirement, you must make smart choices with your 401(k) plan. This is especially important for baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964. For a secure retirement, avoiding mistakes and maximizing growth opportunities is crucial. Here are some common mistakes people make with 401(k) plans and solutions to improve retirement prospects.

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Commentary: The Absurd Democrat Border Con

Virginia Star Staff
Illegal Immigrants

In 2021, Joe Biden opened wide an inherited, secure southern border that had finally stopped mass illegal immigration.

When he overturned Donald Trump’s efforts, a planned flood of over 8 million illegal immigrants entered the U.S.

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Commentary: This Has to Be the End of the Road for Mitch McConnell

Virginia Star Staff
Mitch McConnell Senate

Mitch McConnell has to be finished as the caucus leader for the Republicans in the Senate. Now. He has to resign, and if he won’t, then that caucus needs to get together and force him out.

Now. Not next week, not next month, not after this election cycle. Now.

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Commentary: Inflation Is the Reason Joe Biden Is So Unpopular

RealClearWire
Joe Biden

We’ve paid much attention to President Biden’s flagging job approval here, in part because it tends to be a strong predictor of how an election will turn out. Biden is marching into this election season as likely the least popular president to face the voters since Herbert Hoover. While he may yet be saved by the fact that he is facing off against Donald Trump, who brings his own baggage to the table, it’s an ominous indicator.

At the same time, the economy is running hot. Growth is over 3%, unemployment is under 4%, and inflation has fallen from its peak. So why the seeming paradox of an unpopular president in a time of strong economic growth, especially when the strength of the economy is itself a traditional predictor of presidential job approval?

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Commentary: The Marxism Behind the Open Border

Virginia Star Staff
Illegal Immigrants

America’s illegal immigration problem created by President Joe Biden’s administration embodies an ideology and achieves a very specific purpose — one that receives nearly no mention because to note it would reveal the game. Illegal immigration is a classic Marxist redistributionist plot. In this case, what’s being redistributed is America’s wealth to third-world nationals with no discernible skills and no intention of becoming “American.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, acting on behalf of the Biden administration, worked tightly with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell to craft a terrible piece of legislation meant to jam not only House Republicans (McConnell’s favored enemy) but the people the House members represent.

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Commentary: The Right Needs to Use Public Policies That Promote Family Values

Virginia Star Staff
Family of Four

It is a tale as old as time. Older generations criticize the young, usually following a particular formula. The seniors say that the young are wimpier, lazier, less ambitious, overly entitled, and have weaker characters. Examples are now easier to come by because of social media, which allows one to encounter different types of people without having to enter their social circles.

While there are many issues of concern among the young, last week a TikTok rant by a young lady about the difficulty of working and paying her bills went viral. She seemed sad and overwhelmed. Her income apparently could barely cover the rent. Of course, she probably needed a smaller place and a roommate, but her complaints are universal, even among those who are more frugal.

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Commentary: Big Tech Needs First Amendment to Censor You

Virginia Star Staff
Smart Phone Filled with Apps

Big Tech is back at the Supreme Court.

Appealing from a big loss they suffered at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, social media platforms are challenging Texas’ social media law that prohibits those companies from engaging in viewpoint discrimination when curating their platforms.

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Commentary: To Rebuild Trust, U.S. Banks Have a Lot of Work to Do

RealClearWire

Trust in banks has plummeted.  From 2019-2022, the percentage of people who believe banks and financial institutions have a positive effect on the country fell among Republicans (from 63 to 38 percent) and Independents (by nine points). The problem grows every time a right-of-center group is debanked. Recognizing the problem, “rebuilding trust” is the theme of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The path to rebuild trust in finance is simple—keep politics out of banking.

In spite of an alleged priority of building trust, the largest banks are aligning themselves with radical United Nations (UN) climate initiatives linked to radical efforts to reduce Africa’s population and destroy Sri Lankan agriculture.

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Commentary: Labor Department’s New Rule Is Bad News for Independent Contractors

Virginia Star Staff
Contract Worker

In what is sure to have significant implications for millions of American workers, specifically gig economy workers and contractors, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued its long-awaited final worker classification rule in January.

The new rule revises the process to determine whether a worker is an employee or independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act. The government argues the rule is necessary to ensure that all workers are provided fair wages and overtime since independent contractors (people who work for themselves or a business on a contractual basis) are not given the same benefits, such as tax withholdings and paid time off, as traditional employees. However, this argument appears designed to mask the government’s true intention, which is to reduce the number of independent contractors in the country.

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Commentary: War Is Not Just a Western Notion

Virginia Star Staff
Sino-Japanese War

“It is well that war is so terrible; otherwise, we should grow too fond of it.”
– Robert E. Lee

“Wars and rumors of wars,” to borrow a well-known Biblical phrase from Matthew 24, seem all too commonplace these days. Is that because more wars are going on now than in the past, or because mass media brings us word of them ‘round the clock? It’s a debatable point.

This much is eminently clear: War dates back as far as the day when Cain slew Abel. It’s doubtful that there ever was a time on Earth when nobody was at war with anybody. It’s a depressingly familiar curse.

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Commentary: Liberals’ Ludicrous ‘Voter Suppression’ Lie Is Really About Something Much Darker

Virginia Star Staff
Early Voting

by Marshal Trigg   President Biden, Vice President Harris, and their allies on the activist left insist that voter suppression is running rampant in the United States. In fact, the opposite is happening. DNC surrogates are fond of crying “voter suppression” wherever laws strengthen election security. Joe Biden infamously dubbed…

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Commentary: Like the Proverbial Frog in a Pot, China Turns the Heat Up Another Degree in Taiwan

Virginia Star Staff

A recent survey of 52 so-called “leading experts” by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) China Power Project did not think the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was capable of conducting an “effective invasion” of Taiwan today and not likely in the rest of this decade. Despite these prognostications, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has not received the word. Despite the assessment of “leading experts,” the CCP has once again demonstrated that they are continuing their preparations to conquer Taiwan.

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Commentary: Pro-Life Leaders Must Engage in Battle Against Abortion Ballot Measures Now

Virginia Star Staff
Pro-Life Rally

Thanks to the Dobbs decision and pro-life leaders, 24 states have laws protecting unborn children at 12 weeks or sooner. Through ballot measures, abortion activists are trying to reverse that progress so anyone can get an abortion anytime, anywhere. These activists are targeting ten pro-life states which have laws that protect 30,000 babies in the womb annually.

The proposed constitutional amendments go far beyond Roe to establish unlimited abortion, eviscerate parental rights, and remove health and safety requirements for women. Though some of the measures include the word “viability,” the broad exceptions in the law ultimately allow elective abortion in all nine months. Ohio Democrats have introduced legislation that does this following the vote on Issue 1 laying bare the policy agenda they are pursuing but denied during the amendment campaign.

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Commentary: The Way to Be a Traditional Wife

Virginia Star Staff
Mom and Kids

More and more women are fearlessly declaring their desire to live more traditionally—to get married, have children, and create a family. Women all over the globe are waking up to the lie that we can “have it all.”

Of course, it takes work, planning, and cooperation to build a healthy marriage and a happy family. Many women might be deep into modern life before they realize it is not as fulfilling as advertised. But we can all change our path and learn to live out our values, no matter when we decide to change. Let’s discuss real, practical strategies for women who are looking to embrace traditional marriage and build a healthy family.

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Commentary: Terrorist Attack Heightens Fears for the Future of Turkish Christians

Virginia Star Staff
Santa Maria Catholic Church

On Jan. 28, two terrorists wearing black balaclavas attacked Santa Maria Catholic Church in Istanbul, Turkey. The assailants entered the church as approximately 40 people were attending Mass. During the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the gunmen began firing. Tragically, Tuncer Cihan was killed. He was about to become a Christian, attended church regularly, and was described as “a good person.”

Thankfully, no one else was injured, as the terrorists fled due to one of the guns miraculously jamming.

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Commentary: The Border Crisis Is Front and Center in Battleground States and Even Liberals Have Had Enough

Virginia Star Staff
Illegal Immigrants CBP

Despite economic issues dominating voters’ minds this election year, the unprecedented chaos at the southern border is forcing immigration into the spotlight, and nearly two-thirds of voters blame Biden for the border crisis.

A blistering new Bloomberg News/Morning Consult survey shows the share of voters who say immigration will be the most important issue to them on election day has risen in six of the seven swing states polled.

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Commentary: Was It Legal to Appoint Jack Smith in the First Place?

Virginia Star Staff
Jack Smith

Was Special Counsel Jack Smith illegally appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland and is his prosecution of former Pres. Donald Trump unlawful? That is the intriguing issue raised in an amicus brief filed in the Supreme Court by Schaerr Jaffe, LLP, on behalf of former Attorney General Ed Meese and two law professors, Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson, in the case of U.S. v. Trump.

We won’t get an immediate answer to this question because on the Friday before Christmas, the Supreme Court issued a one-line order refusing to take up Smith’s request that the court review Trump’s claim of presidential immunity, which was denied by the trial court, in the federal prosecution being pursued by Smith in the District of Columbia. The special counsel had petitioned the court to take the case on an expedited basis, urging the justices to bypass review by the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

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Commentary: Ban TikTok or Let Beijing Control Our Broadcast Networks, Too

RealClearWire
Tiktok User

In the dynamic landscape of global entertainment, the influence of Beijing over Hollywood has long been a topic of heated discussion. While the box office power of the Chinese market has waned, giving a breath of creative freedom back to our filmmakers, there looms a new and more pervasive form of influence on Hollywood and well beyond: TikTok.

Beijing may have lost theatrical market leverage, but it has more than made up for that with an overpowering social media presence that has become an epidemic, not just in Hollywood but throughout the United States. In fact, the Chairman of Congress’s Select Committee on China, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI), accurately labels TikTok as “digital fentanyl” and has been aggressively campaigning to ban the social media app.

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Commentary: When the Invaders Outnumber the Army

Virginia Star Staff

According to the website Statista, the United States has the third largest standing “Army” in the world. The website says that we have 1.3 million soldiers under arms. By “soldiers,” they’re referring to all of our armed forces—Army, Marines, Navy, Air Force, and Space Force. Third largest in the world. Not bad, if you’re into measuring things. China and India are the only countries with larger militaries. Russia has one about the same size as us, as does North Korea.

In addition to our active force, Statista says we have over 760,000 reservists attached to our armed forces. For those unfamiliar, a reservist is also a soldier (generic term) who can theoretically be called into duty to do things the active forces do. They’re called reservists because they are the first line of replenishment for the active force. Reservists serve in various capacities in all of the branches of the US military. They train once a month with their unit and have a two-week annual training event where they go to an installation and ensure their skills are ready for wartime. Some call them weekend warriors. I call them heroes—many or most have other jobs and serve our great country because they want to serve. Of key importance is that all of these service members are federally authorized and work at the direction of the president.

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Commentary: School Choice Keeps Spreading

Virginia Star Staff
Classroom

In just three years, the number of states with universal or near-universal private school choice programs has grown from zero to 10, and the number of students eligible for these programs has increased by 60%. According to the latest ABCs of School Choice – EdChoice’s comprehensive report about all matters pertaining to educational freedom—32 states (plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico) are using school choice as of 2023. Additionally, policymakers in 40 states debated 111 educational choice bills last year alone. Overall, approximately 20 million students—or 36% of all kids—are now eligible for some kind of private-choice program.

But what’s good for children and their families is problematic for the teachers’ unions and their fellow travelers. As such, on January 22—not coincidentally the beginning of National School Choice Week—the Partnership for the Future of Learning released a toolkit, maintaining that “voucher programs are “deeply rooted in segregation, racism, and discrimination.” The PFL, which is comprised of predominantly left-wing outfits—the National Education Association, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Learning Policy Institute, etc.—adds that private schools “do not have necessary accountability measures.”

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Commentary: The Delusions of Davos and Dubai Surrounding Wind and Solar Energy

Virginia Star Staff
Solar Energy

In the most recent “Conference of the Parties,” otherwise known as the United Nations extravaganza that convenes every few years for world leaders to discuss the climate crisis, several goals were publicly proclaimed. Notable were the goals to triple production of renewable energy by 2030 and triple production of nuclear energy by 2050. Against the backdrop of current global energy production by fuel type, and as quantified in Part One, against a goal of increasing total energy production from 600 exajoules in 2022 to at least 1,000 exajoules by 2050, where does COP 28’s goals put the world’s energy economy? How much will production of renewable energy have to increase?

To answer this question, it is necessary to recognize and account for the fact that most renewable energy takes the form of electricity, generated through wind, solar, or geothermal sources. And when measuring how much the base of renewables installed so far will contribute to the target of 1,000 exajoules of energy production per year in order to realize—best-case scenario—800 exajoules of energy services, the data reported in the Statistical Review of Global Energy is profoundly misleading.

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Commentary: The Deep State will Receive a Shellacking Come November

Virginia Star Staff
Trump White House

President Donald Trump heads into February’s South Carolina primary in a formidable position—the strongest ever in his political career. Following Iowa’s near-clean sweep, in which the 45th President picked up 98 of 99 counties in the Hawkeye State (and the one county he lost by just a single vote), he routed the New Hampshire primary with a double-digit victory, once again winning all but a single county in the Granite State.

The momentum he carried into New Hampshire was so resounding that it forced Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, once hyped as President Trump’s successor not so long ago, to drop out of the race days before the first official vote was even tallied. The New Hampshire result, which saw Trump thrash Haley with a 54% to 43% margin, would have been wider, but for all the former-Democrats-turned-undecideds in the state, who teamed up with left-leaning independents to artificially tilt the scales towards Haley.

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Commentary: The Beltway Judge Hearing Trump Cases and Her Anti-Trump, Anti-Kavanaugh Husband

RealClearWire

Washington glitterati assembled at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in October to celebrate federal employees making a difference in government. Hosted by CNN anchor Kate Bolduan, the black-tie affair featured in-person appearances by top Biden White House officials including Chief of Staff Jeffrey Zients, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, and Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack.

Midway through the evening’s festivities, Max Stier, president of the group sponsoring the event – the Partnership for Public Service, a $24 million nonprofit based in Washington that recruits individuals to work in the civil service – took the stage to thank his high-profile guests. “Great leaders are the heart and soul of effective organizations,” Stier said, “which is why I am so thankful to see so many of our government’s amazing leaders here tonight.”

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Commentary: Virginia’s Veterans Deserve Better

Virginia Star Staff
US Veterans

Ranger Buddy, Wing Man, Swim Partner.

The Armed Services drills individuals from day one that you are part of a team. The military member is not alone. The chain of command has your back. But this doctrine, while well-known to those who have served in the military, may soon change depending on the outcome of an ongoing legislative debate in Richmond.

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Commentary: After Sweeping Iowa and New Hampshire, Trump Faces the Supreme Court Primary

Virginia Star Staff

After sweeping the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary — the first Republican in a competitive presidential nomination race to do so since the GOP started using the Iowa caucus in 1976 — former President Donald Trump will run unopposed in the Nevada caucus on Feb. 8 and appears to be safely ahead in polls in the South Carolina primary on Feb. 24.

The Republican National Committee even briefly considered naming Trump the “presumptive” GOP nominee before the plan was scrapped.

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Commentary: The Key to Defeat the Democrats’ Weaponization of Government Lies in Radical Decentralization

Virginia Star Staff

Reading Matt Taibbi’s summary how the Democrats weaponized the government against Donald Trump, starting before the election of 2016 and proceeding right up to the present moment, I am reminded once again that the issue is not democracy but “Our Democracy™.”

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Commentary: Clever Teachers Unions Embed Socialism into Their Contracts

Virginia Star Staff

From Boston to Los Angeles, teachers’ unions and their progressive counterparts have quietly devised an unprecedented method to bypass the legislative process by embedding unrelated policy issues deep within the intricate terms of teacher contracts.

This new, covert strategy, hidden in plain sight, allows state and municipal officials to create sweeping policy changes that evade the scrutiny typically associated with customary legislative procedures, which include publicly available draft legislation, committee hearings, amendments and comprehensive floor debates.

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Commentary: ‘Disturbing’ Collusion Between Biden White House and Trump Prosecutors

Julie Kelly

Before the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith in November 2022, Joe Biden’s Department of Justice was in the process of conducting two separate criminal investigations into Donald Trump: his attempts to “overturn” the 2020 election and his alleged mishandling of sensitive government files.

Smith took over both matters to demonstrate the DOJ’s “independence” from politics, the public was told, although he took with him prosecutors and investigators already assigned to the existing inquiries. His team continues to insist their work is devoid of any influence from or cooperation with the Biden regime. Joe Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland say the same.

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Commentary: 100 Canadian Churches Torched or Damaged Following Indian Residential School Graves Hoax

Virginia Star Staff
St Jean Baptiste

To its credit, the London-based tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail recently carried a story most corporate news outlets have been avoiding: The Indian Residential School Graves hoax.

The paper, whose article titles are characteristically long and descriptive, leaves little mystery in the scandalous story’s headline: “Nearly ONE HUNDRED churches across Canada have been torched or damaged after activists lied that 200 indigenous children were buried under Catholic schools.”

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Commentary: The Tricky Business of Branding

Virginia Star Staff
Patagonia Clothing

Brand development has become a major focus for firms hoping to find or maintain success in advanced markets. According to Steve Forbes, “Your brand is the single most important investment you can make in your business.” And he certainly is right.

A brand not only serves to identify firms and what they offer, it also conveys a company’s positioning strategy and value proposition. Promotional elements such as logos, names, symbols, and colors, are commonly leveraged for branding purposes but a brand can also be reinforced through pricing and distribution systems. For instance, if a company wants their product to be viewed as the best of the best, then they wouldn’t want it to be found on the shelves at a discount store. This is why Burberry has been known to burn excess inventory and perhaps it is also why premium brands will leverage opportunities to recycle their products.

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Commentary: Dual Enrollment Is a Homeschool Resource

Virginia Star Staff
Mom and daughter learning

This year marks the completion of high school for two of my children. Navigating the high school years has been both exciting and challenging. By the time our children had reached high school age, two things were apparent. First, homeschooling had allowed my kids to find and pursue their special interests—ones that had future career potential.

Second, while mastery of most subjects had been relatively easy, math and science were a bit more difficult. Despite overall higher testing outcomes within the homeschool community, there is a documented math gap for many homeschoolers. In other words, most homeschoolers score slightly lower than their non-homeschooled peers in math and science. (This is understandable, of course: I don’t know many mothers qualified to teach high-level math or science, and most of us don’t want our kitchens being turned into chemistry labs.)

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Commentary: The Left’s Ridiculous Disinformation on Tainted Zuck Bucks

Virginia Star Staff
Zuck Bucks

Anyone who’s followed the Mark Zuckerberg “Zuck bucks” story since 2020 has witnessed some spectacular acrobatics from the left.

First, it was denial that a partisan billionaire was trying to privatize the election in swing states. Then, when Democrats unseated President Trump, NPR and others praised Zuck bucks for “saving” the election. When the 2022 midterms came, the cry was for more private funding to “rehabilitate” democracy. Now the media’s latest stop: gaslighting the public into believing any criticism of leftist “dark money” is just conservative propaganda, rather than one of the worst election innovations of our time.

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Commentary: Logically.AI of Britain and the Expanding Global Reach of Censorship

RealClearWire
Computer Keyboard

Brian Murphy, a former FBI agent who once led the intelligence wing of the Department of Homeland Security, reflected last summer on the failures of the Disinformation Governance Board – the panel formed to actively police misinformation. The board, which was proposed in April 2022 after he left DHS, was quickly shelved by the Biden administration in a few short months in the face of criticism that it would be an Orwellian state-sponsored “Ministry of Truth.”

In a July podcast, Murphy said the threat of state-sponsored disinformation meant the executive branch has an “ethical responsibility” to rein in the social media companies. American citizens, he said, must give up “some of your freedoms that you need and deserve so that you get security back.”

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Commentary: The Elite One Percent Behind the Cultural Civil War

Virginia Star Staff
American Flag

Scott Rasmussen has done America an enormous service. He and his team have identified the driving forces behind the destructive radicalism which is pushing us into a cultural civil war.

While doing their two weekly national surveys, Rasmussen and his team noticed an anomaly. Out of every 1,000 or so respondents, there would always be three or four who were far more radical than everyone else. After several months of finding these unusual responses, Rasmussen realized they all shared three characteristics.

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