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On Wednesday, Live Action founder Lila Rose appeared on Dave Rubin’s YouTube show for an hour-long discussion about abortion. Although the entire hour is well worth watching, there were three moments that stood out as particularly illuminating. Why Does Pain Make A Human? The first important exchange came when Rubin told Rose that before a fetus can feel pain, he would leave the decision regarding abortion with the mother. Rose then rhetorically asked Rubin why “pain” is where the line is drawn. RUBIN: I often describe myself as begrudgingly pro-choice. I think I view this probably as horrifically a choice as you do. You don’t think it’s a choice, per say, but I view the idea here as probably as horrific as you do. I don’t think that something at 18 weeks is not a life. So, when I discussed this with Ben Shapiro … my position at the time was that at 20 weeks, there is more than ample evidence that the fetus can start feeling pain, and I would view that up until that point … I would...

On Thursday’s episode of “The Andrew Klavan Show,” the host speaks with constitutional lawyer and Trump 2020 advisory board member Jenna Ellis about the Trump administration’s attempts to eliminate the individual mandate in Obamacare. Transcript and video below. Andrew Klavan: The Trump administration is now saying that Obamacare is not constitutional. They are supporting a judge who said this. First of all, do you agree with that? Jenna Ellis: Absolutely. And so, from just a purely constitutional perspective health care is not a subject matter that is given to federal Congress to write the law. So regardless of the policy considerations, we can debate all day what should be health care provision and policy in America, but that is not given to Congress that’s given to the states to decide and really the individual as well. Because when we look at the separation of powers everyone always thinks of it horizontally as being between the legislative, executive, and judiciary. But we forge...

The stunning announcement Tuesday that all 16 felony charges against “Empire” star Jussie Smollett were dropped without clear explanation has prompted a massive backlash against the state’s attorney from key figures and entities in the city, among them Democratic Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the Chicago Police Department, and the Chicago Tribune, which has devoted several articles to calling out the “indefensible” actions of Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx and her office. In a column Thursday, the Tribune’s Eric Zorn makes the case that Foxx “will and should lose her job” over her office’s’ “spectacularly” bad handling of Smollett. Justice in the Smollett case “demanded resolution and accountability,” writes Zorn, yet “Foxx appeared oblivious to this imperative as she made the media rounds attempting to explain why her office sent Smollett on his merry way Tuesday morning without extracting an admission of guilt or collecting a meaningful fine.” In her much-criticized media appearances...

On Thursday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Christian conservative, sent a letter to San Antonio mayor Ron Nirenberg and members of the city council announcing that he was opening an investigation into San Antonio’s decision to exclude Chick-fil-A, which has strong Christian views, from opening concession facilities in an airport terminal. As The Texas Tribune noted of Chick-fil-A, “Its corporate purpose is ‘to glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that is entrusted to us and to have a positive influence on all who come into contact with Chick-fil-A.’ It is, famously, ‘closed on Sundays.’” Paxton wrote: Dear Mayor Nirenberg and City Councilmembers: The Constitution’s protection of religious liberty is somehow even better than Chick-fil- A’s chicken. Unfortunately, I have serious concerns that both are under assault at the San Antonio airport. Please see the enclosed letter from my office to Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao highlighting my concerns that the Cit...

This was “speaking truth to power.” After the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People disgraced itself this year by nominating “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett for one of its coveted Image awards, it took a foul-mouthed comedian to put the whole matter into perspective. And for Chris Rock, all it took was a lot of guts. When Rock took the stage at Saturday night’s 50th NAACP Image Awards in Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre, he made it crystal clear that he was operating under specific orders. “They said, ‘no Jussie Smollett jokes,’” Rock told his audience. And he made it just as clear that he wasn’t going to go along, with a series of jabs at Smollett capped by one question: “What the hell was he thinking?” Check it out here (warning: some rough language): Chris Rock: Jussie Smollett, You Don't Get No Respect From Me #ImageAwards50 pic.twitter.com/97vpDkLltQ — TV One (@tvonetv) March 31, 2019 As odd as the whole Smollett case is, with an apparently completely...

Major television networks are refusing to air commercials for pro-life film “Unplanned,” which tells the story of a former Planned Parenthood director who left the organization after witnessing the horrors of abortion firsthand. The film made its debut Friday in over 1,000 theaters nationwide, but networks outside of Fox News don’t want their viewers to see the movie’s advertisements. Marketers for “Unplanned” told The Hollywood Reporter that networks are denying their attempts to buy air time because of the film’s “sensitive nature.” The marketers have been denied by the Travel Channel, Cooking Channel, HGTV, Food Network, Hallmark Channel and USA Network. John Sullivan, a producer for “Unplanned,” explained that they are looking to spend money on air time, but networks are refusing to do business with them. “We were looking to spend money, but they didn’t want to get involved,” Sullivan said. Another producer for the film, Joe Knopp, explained that networks are refusing “Unplan...

Democratic presidential contenders began weighing in over the weekend on whether former Vice President Joe Biden should join the race for the 2020 Democratic nomination now that he’s been accused of sexual harassment and “inappropriate touching” by a former colleague — and they want real answers. In an essay published last week in New York Magazine, Lucy Flores, who was a former Democratic nominee for Nevada governor, claimed that Biden became inappropriately affectionate at a campaign rally in 2014, while he was serving as the nation’s vice president, kissing her on the back of the head and making her feel “uneasy, gross, and confused.” “I felt him get closer to me from behind. He leaned further in and inhaled my hair. I was mortified,” Flores wrote. “He proceeded to plant a big slow kiss on the back of my head. My brain couldn’t process what was happening. I was embarrassed. I was shocked. I was confused.” The issue quickly made a splash among 2020 Democratic contenders, who have ...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) butchered the Constitution Friday during an extended town hall discussion with MSNBC host Chris Hayes in which the freshman lawmaker fielded questions about the controversial “Green New Deal.” Prompted by economics professor Mark Paul to list the lessons from Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal that could be recycled for postmodern America, Ocasio-Cortez suggested there is “a lot.” “One, is that when we look into our history when our party was boldest time of the New Deal, the Great Society, the Civil Rights Act and so on we had and carried supermajorities in the House in the Senate we carried the presidency,” the New York Democrat explained. Then came her constitutional blunder. “They had to amend the Constitution of the United States to make sure Roosevelt did not get re-elected,” she claimed. However, the Constitution was not amended to prevent FDR from winning re-election. In fact, FDR was elected president four times. He died in April ...

Comedian Chris Rock was instructed to steer clear of Jussie Smollett jokes while presenting an award at the NAACP Image Awards Friday, but the legendary entertainer just couldn’t help himself. Instead, Rock chided Smollett for allegedly orchestrating a hate crime hoax against himself. “They said no Jussie Smollett jokes. Yeah, I know I know. What a waste of white skin. You know what I could do with that light skin? That curly hair? My career would be out of here — I’d be f**king running Hollywood,” Rock joked. “What the hell was he thinking?” he continued. “From now on, you’re Jessie from now on. You don’t even get the ‘U’ no more. That ‘U’ was respect. You don’t get no respect from me.” The crowd loved Rock’s jokes, especially Trevor Noah, who hosts “The Daily Show” on Comedy Central. Chris Rock: Jussie Smollett, You Don't Get No Respect From Me #ImageAwards50 pic.twitter.com/97vpDkLltQ — TV One (@tvonetv) March 31, 2019 More from Variety: Earlier in the evening, Lena ...

cAmid a growing border crisis and news that the “mother of all caravans” is journeying north from Central America, President Donald Trump on Friday threatened to shut down the border to alleviate overwhelming stress on U.S. immigration resources. But just how bad is the situation at the border? According to a new USA Today story detailing the situation, local officials say the crisis has entered unprecedented territory. In Texas especially, “masses of migrants have been crossing the border in unprecedented numbers, overwhelming federal holding facilities and sending local leaders and volunteers scrambling to deal with the relentless waves of people,” USA Today reported. “It’s staggering. Really, we’ve never seen anything like this before,” McAllen City Manager Roy Rodriguez told USA Today. The problem is not necessarily immigrants crossing into the U.S. illegally. Rather, migrants are applying for political asylum en masse, overwhelming U.S. immigration resources. Smugglers know th...

The United States is cutting off aid to El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras for failing to put an end to the numerous migrant caravans that are overwhelming the U.S.-Mexico border. “We were paying them tremendous amounts of money,” President Donald Trump said on Friday. “And we’re not paying them anymore. Because they haven’t done a thing for us. They set up these caravans.” “At the Secretary’s instruction, we are carrying out the President’s direction and ending FY 2017 and FY 2018 foreign assistance programs for the Northern Triangle,” a State Department spokesperson said, according to CNN. “We will be engaging Congress as part of this process.” Mexico Daily News reported on Wednesday that Mexican Federal Interior Secretary Olga Sánchez Cordero said that the “mother of all caravans” was forming in Honduras and that it contains an estimated 20,000 people. Obama-era DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson said this week that the situation on the southern border is so dire that “we are truly in ...

California resident Tyler Barriss was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Federal judge in Wichita on Friday in a plea deal for over 50 charges related to making false reports to police in order to provoke incidents such as the one that killed an innocent man in Kansas. “Swatting” (or SWAT-ing) is the practice, sometimes grossly under-labeled as a ‘hoax” or a “prank’ of reporting violent crime occurring at someone’s residence in order to provoke an armed police response. Barriss placed such calls all across the country. In the Kansas death, the precipitating event was a dispute between two video gamers. Casey Viner 19, and Shane Gaskill, 20. Court documents show that Barriss stated Viner asked him to “swat” Gaskill over the argument. Gaskill dared Barriss to go through with it, but provided an address where he no longer resided. It was at that address, where Barriss falsely reported to police that there was a homicide and a hostage situation, that the then current resident Andrew F...

An electromagnetic pulse attack would, in theory, be intended to knock out power, electronics, computers, cell phones, and essentially the infrastructure of modern daily life. An EMP can be produced with nuclear weapons, and currently we aren’t very shielded against them. This week, President Trump issued an executive order directing the Federal government to actions to “foster sustainable, efficient, and cost-effective approaches to improving the Nation’s resilience to the effects of EMPs.” The order states that the government “shall engage in risk-informed planning, prioritize research and development (R&D) to address the needs of critical infrastructure stakeholders, and, for adversarial threats, consult Intelligence Community assessments.” It directs that the private sector be involved in modernization, including the privately owned electrical grids overseen by utilities, that the government create protocols for providing warning of natural or man-made surges, and come up wi...

Outrage erupted this week when the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office announced it was dropping all charges against actor Jussie Smollett, who had been indicted on 16 felony counts in relation to allegedly orchestrating a hate crime hoax against himself. After the controversial announcement, ratings for “Empire,” the FOX show on which Smollett starred, collapsed to an “all-time low.” After returning from a mid-season hiatus, the show received 3.97 million overall viewers during Wednesday night’s show, the lowest in the history of the series, according to TV Line. For comparison, the show has routinely averaged more than 10 million viewers, though later seasons of the show have slowly seen ratings decline. After the shocking announcement that all criminal charges against had been dropped, Smollett revealed that he is eager to continue working on “Empire,” although it’s not clear if his character will make a return. However, in a statement, 20th Century FOX Entertainment said it ...

Earlier this year, Davis, CA, police officer Natalie Corona was shot and killed while responding to a call about a car crash. While Corona conducted an investigation into what caused the crash, a man riding a bicycle, later identified as Kevin Douglas Limbaugh, approached the scene. He shot Corona as she spoke to someone involved in the crash. She fell, and he continued shooting her. He then began shooting bystanders. He fled into a nearby residence and, after a standoff with other officers, committed suicide, according to the Washington Post. At the University of California-Davis, a reporter for the student newspaper the California Aggie, decided to use the officer’s death to look into rumors that a professor on campus had previously advocated for cops to be killed. Nick Irvin, the reporter, found several tweets disparaging police from professor Joshua Clover, who teaches English and comparative literature. “I am thankful that every living cop will one day be dead, some by their own...

On Friday, the Georgia House followed the Georgia Senate’s lead and passed the ‘ Living Infants Fairness and Equality Act’, popularly referred to as the ‘Heartbeat bill’, despite a major effort by Hollywood liberals to put a stop to it. Georgia’s governor, Republican Brian Kemp, previously vowed to sign the legislation if it makes it to his desk. After the House vote assuring that it will, Kemp tweeted a statement. “Georgia values life.” he wrote. ” We stand up for the innocent and speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. The legislature’s bold action reaffirms our priorities and who we are as a state. I thank these lawmakers for their leadership and applaud their undeniable courage.” The bill passed the Georgia House with a vote of 92 to 78, despite a massive effort by pro-abortion Hollywood liberals to use their social. political, and financial cachet to stop it. At issue is that the bill essentially prohibits abortions from taking place after a fetal heartbeat has been d...

Yet another airport has banned Chick-fil-A from opening a restaurant due to the Christian company’s alleged “anti-LGBTQ” views. The development comes just one week after San Antonio, Texas, made national headlines for a similar decision. The San Antonio City Council blocked Chick-fil-A from operating at its airport, claiming the city does “not have room in our public facilities for a business with a legacy of anti-LGBTQ behavior.” On Thursday, Delaware North, the hospitality company that manages food operations at the Buffalo Niagara International Airport, and the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority approved tentative plans to allow a Chick-fil-A restaurant to open at the airport, according to New York Upstate. But the plan was met with immediate opposition from progressive lawmakers who claim Chick-fil-A is a discriminatory organization, despite the company’s continual re-affirmation that it, in fact, does not discriminate against any customer, even those who identify with th...

Delaware Gov. John Carney, a Democrat, signed into law this week a bill allocating his state’s three electoral college votes to whichever candidate wins the so-called “national popular vote,” should a sufficient number of allied states’ votes be similarly committed. This makes Delaware the 13th state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, a movement being pushed almost exclusively by Democrats as a way to dispense with the electoral college and select the President based on a raw vote total. To take effect they require 270 electoral votes. The addition of Delaware brings the current total to 184. It was brought to 181 just two weeks ago when Colorado signed on. The push has been resisted by Republican legislatures, particularly in states that will see their voice dramatically diminished if not eliminated in presidential politics by a national popular vote, which would make large population centers, mostly in blue coastal areas, almost the sole focus of issue campaigni...

Twitter suspended the account for the pro-life “Unplanned” movie Saturday, an untimely move given this weekend marked the movie’s opening weekend in theaters nationwide. The move comes amid ongoing discussion over the role technology giants, like Facebook, Twitter, and Google, play in policing “hate speech” online. Conservatives argue social media companies disproportionally target their content, often suppressing it from news feeds or removing it altogether. Around lunchtime Saturday, conservatives on Twitter noticed the account for “Unplanned” had been suspended without notice. Twitter just suspended @UnplannedMovie during the weekend of its theatrical release. @jack why are they suspended? You’ve banned both my & @LiveAction account from all promotions simply bc we’re pro-life. Have you banned this account because it challenges your pro-abortion bias? pic.twitter.com/TBarDx2sU4 — Lila Rose (@LilaGraceRose) March 30, 2019 Lila Rose, the prominent pro-life activist who ...

On Friday, retired long-distance runner Paula Radcliffe voiced her concern regarding male-to-female (MTF) transgender athletes in elite sports. Appearing on BBC Radio 5 Live, Radcliffe stated: [There] are absolutely probably hundreds of transgenders who want to take part in sport, for all the other benefits that it brings, and all we’re saying is, “That’s fine, but not elite sport,” because elite sport, that female section of elite sport, has to be protected so that females can genuinely reach the top of it. Radcliffe then compared “intersex” athletes, who were born with anatomical or chromosomal irregularities, to transgender athletes, saying that “they haven’t chosen to make that change, which is what is happening in transgender because they should be [in] a male sport, and if they have chosen to transition, then they’re asking to compete in female sport, and I think that is much more clear cut and easier rule to rule on.” Earlier in March, Radcliffe, who holds the record for fa...

The official Team Trump campaign store has a new product for sale this weekend, a tee-shirt based on the President’s most recent nasty nickname for a fellow politician. The new product is is th “Little Pencil-Neck Adam Schiff” tee-shirt, and we don’t know how sales are doing but it definitely got buzz. Here’s the original tweet, which includes an animated gif we assume isn’t available on the actual shirt: Little Pencil-Neck Adam Schiff He spent two years knowingly and unlawfully lying and leaking. He should be forced to resign from Congress! Everyone should buy a Pencil-Neck Adam Schiff shirt today! BUY Now: https://t.co/5SMsrJC8nU pic.twitter.com/v3Vvmma0e6 — Official Team Trump (@TeamTrump) March 29, 2019 The shit has caused some outrage on social media, as all things that exist do, and of note among blue check types in the media. Sure! This is all fine! https://t.co/SGe48TA187 — Chris Cillizza (@CillizzaCNN) March 30, 2019 A banner day for Melania's 'Be Be...

The political rule about kids being off-limits is very selectively applied in general, and like other political boundaries under over the last few years, is especially subject to transgression if President Trump is involved. Take the case of the Special Olympics, for example. Education Secretary Betsy Devos has been under fire from Democrats for days over Dept. of Education cuts that would affect funding for the organization that provides athletic opportunities and competition for for children and adults with intellectual and physical disabilities. Ostensibly the outrage is born of an abundance of compassion and caring regarding those opportunities and that mission. But for a few Ohio Democrats, it was more of an opportunity to take a shot at the President’s minor son. Thomas LaDuke at RedState highlighted this week the Facebook postings of some prominent Democrats, including from Cuyahoga County, home of Cleveland, site of the 2016 Republican National Convention where Donald Trump ...

Yet another airport has banned Chick-fil-A from doing business for its socially conservative views on biblical marriage. According to Fox News, the Buffalo Niagara International Airport suspended plans to construct a Chick-fil-A restaurant approved by the hospitality management company Delaware North and the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority (NFTA). The decision followed Assemblyman Sean Ryan blasting the NFTA on Twitter for allegedly doing business “with corporations who fund hateful and divisive groups.” I'm disappointed in the @NFTA decision to bring a Chick-fil-A to the @BUFAirport . pic.twitter.com/zP0oIUOz3q — Assemblyman Sean Ryan (@SeanMRyan149) March 29, 2019 “I strongly urge the NFTA to reverse this decision,” Ryan continued. “I don’t believe the leadership of the NFTA intends to help spread hate and discrimination, but allowing a corporation like Chick-fil-A to do business at the Buffalo Niagara International Airport will help to fund continued divisive a...

Paula Radcliffe, the fastest women’s marathon runner in history, spoke out against transgender athletes competing in elite women’s sports and was attacked by transgender activists on social media for her opinion. She was speaking on BBC Radio when she made the comments comparing transgender athletes to “normal” athletes. “Actually transitioning is a choice,” she explained. “Whereas an intersex athlete, it’s just the way they were born, they haven’t chosen for their body to be producing more testosterone, they haven’t chosen for it to be like this. “And they’re not cheating in any way,” Radcliffe continued, “and it’s really difficult, because the levels of testosterone mean that it’s essentially not fair competition with the females with normal levels of testosterone.” Radcliffe was careful to motion for air quotes when she said “normal” but she was still attacked later for using the phrase as a distinction. “But they haven’t chosen to make that change which is what is happening in...