Kerby Anderson
On Independence Day, Federal Judge Terry Doughty issued a national injunction preventing federal bureaucracies from corresponding with social-media firms. It sent shock waves through the Biden administration and Silicon Valley. James Bovard asked, “When did the Biden administration become infallible with a divine right to nullify the free speech of conservatives?”
The federal judge described the evidence he saw as “the most massive attack against free speech in United States’ history.” He argued that the Biden administration pressured social-media companies “to censor misinformation regarding climate change, gender discussions, abortion, and economic policy.”
Censorship began at the very start of the Biden era. Less than two weeks after the inauguration, the White House Digital Director demanded that Twitter “immediately” remove a parody of Biden’s relatives. “Twitter officials suspended the account within 45 minutes but complained they were already bombarded by White House censorship requests at that point.”
A federal agency, tasked with countering foreign influence, was renamed the Mis-, Dis-, and Mal-information task force. It led the way in shutting down any discussion about concerns about the 2020 and 2022 elections.
The FBI convinced companies to change their policies and ban posts based on “hacked materials.” Then it became easy to censor any comments about Hunter Biden’s laptop arguing it was hacked material or else Russian disinformation.
The federal judge imposed a sweeping injunction banning federal agencies from contacting social-media companies. Considering all this evidence, it is easy to see why he did this.

Penna Dexter
In the bellwether state of Ohio, it’s easy to pass a constitutional amendment. It only takes 50 percent of a vote of the people. That’s why the state constitution has nearly 70,000 words. (The U.S. Constitution has 7000.)
Buckeye conservatives have seen the ease of amending Ohio’s constitution as a vulnerability for years. Aaron Baer, President of Ohio’s Center for Christian Virtue says, “it’s led to so many different issues and so many different problems that we’ve wanted to fix it.”
They’ve got their chance. A proposed amendment to enshrine abortion rights in Ohio’s constitution provides some urgency.
The Right to Make Reproductive Decisions Including Abortion Initiative — would wipe out abortion restrictions on the books in Ohio, including parental consent legislation. The amendment contains loopholes for transgender surgeries. According to The Washington Stand’s Susanne Bowdey, “If it passes, Ohio moms and dads will have zero say over their children’s abortions or bodily mutilation.”  
Ohio is a pro-life state. Lawmakers there passed and the governor signed a six-week heartbeat law that is currently being blocked by the courts. But, in recent weeks, U-Haul trucks arrived at the state capital bearing 710,000 petition signatures, 300,000 more than required to get the amendment on the November ballot. Planned Parenthood and the ACLU are pouring tens of millions of dollars into the signature-gathering effort.
The idea here is to undermine the work of Ohio’s pro-life legislature.
Conservatives in Ohio’s general assembly launched a counterattack. They set a vote to take place August 8, a special election in which voters will decide whether to raise the threshold for altering the state constitution from a simple majority to a 60 percent “supermajority.”
The pro-abortion left cannot rely on grassroots support. So special interests paid out-of-state signature-gatherers to get a radical pro-abortion amendment on the ballot in Ohio. They will spend heavily, and use manipulative messaging, to get the vote out. Passing Issue 1 makes that harder.

Kerby Anderson
A recent op-ed by Allen Mashburn reminds us that, “Societies That Surrender Moral Foundation Historically Self-Destruct.” This is not a new idea. Decades ago, I did a week of radio programs on the “Decline of a Nation.” A decade later, I did another week on “When Nations Die” because of a book that was published with that title. And more recently I even did a week of programs based on a book that compared America to Rome.
The reason for Mashburn’s article was a series events that took place during Pride Month. He “never envisioned a day where transvestites would lecture us on human biology, or sterilizers would pose as health professionals advocating for human rights. It seems that our nation has descended into a state of utter madness, where men can now claim pregnancy and the number of genders rivals the alphabet.”
Those issues are just a few of the many legitimate concerns which point to the well-documented decline and fall of other civilizations. Greece tolerated and even celebrated immoral behavior. And “the decline of the Roman Empire can be attributed to the abandonment of strong familial bonds and moral values in favor of weakness and laxity.” He observes that the similarity between Rome and America is alarming.
Of course, the pattern we recognize in Greece and Rome can be seen in other civilizations in the past. This includes the Egyptians, the Babylonians, the Persians, and even the nation of Israel. In Isaiah 5 we read that God pronounced judgement on Israel. “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.”
The only way to reverse this downward moral spiral is for a spiritual revival and spiritual repentance to take place in this country.