There's a “crisis in the classroom,” and American children are paying the price, say Armstrong Williams, host of “The Armstrong Williams Show,” and Dr. Ben Carson, a renowned neurosurgeon and former secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
It's “very concerning in our society today, as you see the dumbing down of our people,” Carson says.
Carson and Williams are the authors of “Crisis in the Classroom: Crisis in Education,” and join “The Daily Signal Podcast” to offer solutions to America’s foundering education system. They had a third co-author, Benjamin Crump.
Carson also addresses the role of the federal Department of Education and whether it should be eliminated.
Live Action Founder and President Lila Rose started her undercover work as a teenager, posing as an underage victim of sexual abuse seeking an abortion — but with a camcorder hidden in her blouse to document her conversations with Planned Parenthood workers.
Since then, Live Action has amassed 6 million social media followers and 1.7 billion lifetime video views. And Live Action says their testing has found that Live Action’s content has changed the hearts of 43% of those the organization surveyed on abortion.
I had the pleasure of sitting down with Rose for a Daily Signal interview, during which she shared that she had done a lot of acting in high school and found it natural to empathize with the plight of a girl grappling with an unexpected pregnancy and to pose as this victim, sent by her abuser to do away with the baby.
"I'm 15," Rose said she told the worker. "He's much older than me, 24. What do I do? I'm pregnant."
"In the state of California, that should immediately trigger mandatory reporting," she explained. "But the Planned Parenthood worker, without blinking, told me to lie about my age in the paperwork to get a secret abortion, and no one would know anything."
Rose believes the abortion industry wants to perpetuate negativity around motherhood.
"Planned Parenthood is not interested in women having their babies and they're certainly not doing anything to support those women," she said. "They're interested in women killing their children."
But the Live Action founder also emphasized that modern society faces an existential crisis in which people fail to realize that true happiness comes from relationship with others.
"We're all seeking happiness, but we think we're going to find it in career or we're going to find it in fame or wealth or some sort of material thing when really it can only be found in people," she explained, noting that the ultimate person through which people will find happiness is God. "And so we reject our own children because they're a threat to happiness when really they're actually a key to happiness."
During the massive protesting that took place following the leak of the draft Supreme Court opinion indicating that Roe v. Wade would soon be overturned (and in the months since then) I have frequently heard pro-abortion protestors say that abortion is necessary to allow them to have consequence-free sex.
More than 30 years ago, ordinary residents of China protested in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, where authorities reacted by reportedly killing at least 10,000.
Sean Lin, who traveled to Beijing to attend those protests in 1989, recalls those events as “a historical moment in [China’s] modern history.”
Lin, who served as a U.S. Army microbiologist and is currently an assistant professor in Fei Tian College’s Biomedical Science Department in Middletown, New York, recalls that “not only students actively joined the protests,” but “a lot of civilians from all walks of life all supported this movement.”
“At the time, I think the main theme is anti-corruption because after the Cultural Revolution ended, the Communist Party allowed certain levels of economy reform,” Lin says. “So, many of the party elites quickly get rich using their privilege, using their powers.”
He added: “So, immediately, the Chinese people see the society become polarized … I think it triggered a huge anger against the corruption level at the time.”
Lin brings this frame of reference to discussing the ongoing unrest in China triggered after at least 10 persons died and at least nine were hurt last Thursday in an apartment fire in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region during the nation’s COVID-19 lockdown.
“I think at that time in the 1980s, people definitely were very, very angry and upset about the corruption level. But at that time, nobody even … call for a step-down of the Communist Party,” Lin says.
“But now, 33 years later, I think people are totally disappointed and [have] totally lost any confidence in the Communist Party.”
Lin joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to talk about his experience during the Tiananmen Square protests, his thoughts on the Biden administration’s response to the current protests in China, and his message to those protesting.
A newly elected official in Missouri says his emphasis in his role as state auditor will be to focus on combating left-wing "environmental, social, and governance"—or "ESG"—policies with respect to investments.
"Well, as the state treasurer, I've gained ... a lot more exposure to ESG issue than pretty much anybody in elected office in Missouri. So, I will try to at least use that knowledge that I've gained, and that experience that I have being on the board of the [state] pension plan and working on these issues, to help," Missouri State Treasurer Scott Fitzpatrick, who was elected this month as the state's next auditor, told The Daily Signal.He will take his new office on Jan. 9.
"There's going to be legislation in Missouri this coming session dealing with ESG issues and proxy voting, and things like that. So, as somebody who's been very involved in that conversation at the board level on a pension plan, as well as having been exposed to it a lot through my engagements with the State Financial Officers Foundation, with [The Heritage Foundation], with you guys, the stuff that I've been able to learn, I'm going to be a part of that legislative process in helping develop that legislation," Fitzpatrick said. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)
The incoming Missouri state auditor explained why he's against the use of environmental, social, and governance policies.
Fitzpatrick explained:
Essentially, the reason I am against ESG being used as a tool for investing purposes is because it prioritizes nonfinancial factors in investment decisions, and how you're managing people's investments, over those financial—or what we call pecuniary—factors that should be the priority when you're managing somebody else's money and have a responsibility to them to generate the best return possible on their investment.
Fitzpatrick, a Republican, joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss why he is against those environmental, social, and governance policies; how he will continue his work combating those policies as state auditor; and why he thinks he was able to flip the auditor's seat, which had been held by a Democrat for nearly seven years.
An apartment fire in Urumqi, China, left at least 10 dead and injured at least nine others on Nov. 24, sparking nationwide and global protests against the Chinese Communist Party’s “zero-COVID” policy.
“It was really sparked by the fire in Urumqi. So, China has sort of a practice in its ‘zero-COVID’ policy of when it locks down cities or buildings,” said Michael Cunningham, a research fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Center. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)
“Lots of times it’ll erect barricades or sometimes even lock or weld people inside. And so, we’re not sure if any of that happened, but there’s a public perception that that was probably the case, and that that’s one of the reasons why so many people died in that fire,” he said.
Cunningham also discussed what the protesters are risking by speaking out against the communist regime.
“Well, the protestors are risking everything. The [Chinese Communist Party] is an extremely powerful and an extremely brutal regime. It does not accept any dissent. So, I have to say, protests are not unheard of in China. They’re actually quite common, but they’re usually against local officials,” he explained.
“And so the stakes there aren’t nearly as high as when you’re literally standing up as some protesters have and said the [Chinese Communist Party] and [President] Xi Jinping have to go. Or when they’re standing up and saying, ‘No more totalitarianism. We want democracy,’ which is what we heard in some of the protests, as well, over the weekend,” Cunningham added.
Cunningham joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss the ongoing civil unrest throughout China and protests around the world, the likelihood that Xi could be ousted, and the Vatican’s criticism of the Chinese Communist Party.
