Imagine wiping the city of Houston completely off the map. That’s how many people would have lost their lives if the Hyde Amendment had never been passed. Two million Americans. In the 40 years since Henry Hyde passed his ban on taxpayer-funded abortion, generations of children have celebrated birthdays. They’re alive because Congress realized what everyone should: forcing taxpayers to finance the culture of death is un-American and inhumane.

Yet today, as pro-lifers blow out the candles on four decades of life-saving legislation, liberals are already hard at work to snuff future lives out. Starting with the Democratic platform, the president’s party is on the march to destroy the Hyde Amendment — and put Americans back on the hook for the destruction of innocent unborn children. That won’t be an easy task for Hillary Clinton and company, since more than two-thirds of Americans (including 45 percent of people who call themselves “pro-choice”) oppose this forced partnership between taxpayers and groups like Planned Parenthood. In other words, as Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) says, “The Hyde Amendment is not extreme. Hillary Clinton is.” If we lose the Hyde Amendment, he warns, “our country will be … incentivizing the destruction of the poor and vulnerable by paying for their death. There are nearly 60 million Americans missing from 43 years of legal abortion. That’s 60 million lives with potential that have been snuffed out by state-sanctioned killing. Hillary Clinton poses an existential threat to the welfare and well-being of unborn children and their mothers in the United States and around the world. Rather than expand the culture of death and shred the Hyde amendment — as Hillary Clinton promises — women and men of conscience have a duty to protect the weakest and most vulnerable from the violence of abortion.”

Plenty of liberals will tell you that funding abortions doesn’t increase them. And yet the Left’s own research shows that the Hyde Amendment prevented anywhere from 18-35 percent of abortions. Guttmacher Institute (along with pro-life experts like Dr. Michael New) has also found that when the government subsidizes the taking of innocent unborn life, the number of abortions jumps by a whopping 25 percent. FRC’s Arina Grossu pointed out where the country was without Hyde — and where it would return if Planned Parenthood’s choice for president is elected. “Between 1973 and 1977, the years between Roe v. Wade and the Hyde Amendment becoming law, the federal government spent about $50 million annually to fund approximately 300,000 abortions per year under Medicaid. In defending his amendment, Hyde said we ‘cannot in logic and conscience help fund the execution of these innocent, defenseless human lives.’” Now, as a direct result of this piece of legislation, 60,000 future parents, doctors, inventors teachers, service members, and more are spared every year. (Check out HelloHyde.org to see the faces behind this one-in-nine statistic.) In her piece for The Federalist, Arina points back to the amendment’s namesake, who ended his defense of the language by saying,

“‘Don’t say 'poor woman, go destroy your young, and we will pay for it.’ An innocent, defenseless human life, in a caring and humane society, deserves better than to be flushed down a toilet or burned in an incinerator. The promise of America is that life is not just for the privileged, the planned, or the perfect… [Henry] Hyde was a tireless fighter for preborn babies. More than 2 million people who may not have been ‘privileged,’ ‘planned,’ or ‘perfect’ are alive because of Hyde, and I bet they are quite thankful for it.”

Originally published here.

Once Upon a Times…

Liberals believe in recycling their garbage alright. Every election, the left-leaning press seems to trot out the same tired obituaries about the evangelical movement, desperately hoping that their warnings about our “waning political influence” will come true. Today’s eulogy comes courtesy of The New York Times, which devoted a front-page story to familiar faces in the battle over religious liberty: Betty and Dick Odgaard. The former owners of the Gortz Haus, a church-turned-bistro, first made national headlines when the Odgaards turned down a request to host a same-sex marriage. After an intense legal fight that prompted the couple to give up the business, the Odgaards hit the road to warn other Americans that the threat to their freedom is real.

Now, a year after traveling with conservative presidential candidates and speaking at religious liberty rallies, the New York Times paints the couple as abandoned and isolated — evidence, they claim, of a dwindling evangelical movement. “Torn over Donald Trump and Cut off by Culture Wars, Evangelicals Despair,” the headline read. Using the Odgaards as the icon of a movement of outliers, the Times insists that “One day, they felt comfortably situated in the American majority, as Christians with shared beliefs in God, family and the Bible. They had never even imagined that two people of the same sex could marry. Overnight, it seemed, they discovered that even in small-town Iowa they were outnumbered, isolated, and unpopular… ‘It all flipped, so fast,’ said Mr. Odgaard… ‘Suddenly, we were in the minority. That was kind of a scary feeling. It makes you wonder where the Christians went.’”

Outnumbered, isolated, and unpopular? Unpopular, maybe. But anyone who says evangelicals are outnumbered and isolated either hasn’t been paying attention or has another agenda. With the New York Times, the answer is easy. Like a lot of the liberal media, it desperately wants to depress Christians and suppress election turnout — and the easiest way to accomplish that is to make Christians feel marginalized. Unfortunately for the Times, that trick is as older than The Gray Lady itself. And what’s more, the evidence doesn’t back it up. If anything, the impact of evangelicals is exploding, as we saw in the presidential primaries. In a trend that stumped most political experts, millions of people in interviews and exit polling were suddenly identifying themselves as evangelicals. And while the term has been watered down of late, there’s no question that the movement attracted a lot more attention for its growing size and enthusiasm in this election — making the Times’s characterization of the evangelical movement completely and utter propaganda. That’s not writing, it’s wishful thinking.

If anyone’s being spurned, it this niche news outlet, whose only purpose seems to be currying for elitists who’ve always been anti-Christian. As far as popularity goes, the Times ought to look in the mirror. After two straight quarters of losses, things are looking bleak for the company. Maybe if it spent more time reporting the news instead of making news up, it would recover the trust readers have obviously lost.

Originally published here.

Pledging a Grievance

President Obama set out to fundamentally transform America — and the evidence of his success is everywhere. From the decimated military to the NFL quarterbacks sitting during our national anthem, patriotism has taken one of the biggest hits. Weeks after the San Francisco 49ers’ Colin Kaepernick started a national firestorm by refusing to stand for the “Star Spangled Banner,” the wave of protests are starting to spill over into our classrooms, school board meetings, and sporting events. Just this past Wednesday, seven members of the New York City Council sat in their chairs for the Pledge of Allegiance, in solidarity, they claim, with Kaepernick’s statement against U.S. police. When Mayor Bill de Blasio was asked about the councilmembers’ decision, he said, “I absolutely respect everyone’s First Amendment rights, and I very much respect what’s motivating this protest.”

Unfortunately for our nation, these demonstrations are about a lot more than racial tension or police brutality. What’s happening in the NFL and local councils show how far President Obama and the Left have fractured America. In just two terms, it’s become vogue to attack our national symbols and traditions — and lately, we see that this rebellion is spilling over to those who uphold the law. But there’s a far deeper problem at work than simple disrespect for our anthem or pledge: the attack on religion in America. As George Washington cautioned his young country in his farewell address, “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labour to subvert these great pillars of human happiness.”

Just as there is no virtue without religion and morality, there’s no patriotism either. We cannot have a civil society without virtue; and we cannot have virtue without faith. If Americans are content with riots in our streets and everyone doing what’s right in their own eyes, then by all means, let’s stay this course. Otherwise, a return to patriotism starts with a return to God — in whose name we pledge our country and, we pray, our future.

Originally published here.