Part 4 of Liberty Nation News' special report.

How far and how deep?

Democrats Took Full Control

On our latest episode, we analyze the nationwide victories by Democrats in this week’s Midterms JOHN ROGERS, senior partner and pollster at Cygnal, says Tuesday’s results followed broken promises to lower prices and not get America entangled in foreign conflicts. He also noted that white Evangelical turnout dropped from 26% in 2018 and 23% in 2024 to only 17% this year…a big concern for Republicans going forward. Pastor JACK HIBBS of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills commiserates with unhappy GOP voters declaring “We’re all Californians now: we’re bloody, bruised, but not giving up.” U.S. House Intelligence Committee chairman RICK CRAWFORD (R-TX) warns the election results spell trouble for America’s foreign policy and also endanger National Security as many incoming Democrats have not pledged their support of America. And TONY PERKINS’ commentary offers hope—and a roadmap—for Christians despondent over Tuesday’s Midterm results. All this—and more—coming up on our latest edition of THIS WEEK ON CAPITOL HILL with Tony Perkins, on the Salem Radio Network and Salem News Channel…sponsored by AARP.

On our latest episode, we analyze the nationwide victories by Democrats in this week’s Midterms JOHN ROGERS, senior partner and pollster at Cygnal, says Tuesday’s results followed broken promises to lower prices and not get America entangled in foreign conflicts. He also noted that white Evangelical turnout dropped from 26% in 2018 and 23% in 2024 to only 17% this year…a big concern for Republicans going forward. Pastor JACK HIBBS of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills commiserates with unhappy GOP voters declaring “We’re all Californians now: we’re bloody, bruised, but not giving up.” U.S. House Intelligence Committee chairman RICK CRAWFORD (R-TX) warns the election results spell trouble for America’s foreign policy and also endanger National Security as many incoming Democrats have not pledged their support of America. And TONY PERKINS’ commentary offers hope—and a roadmap—for Christians despondent over Tuesday’s Midterm results. All this—and more—coming up on our latest edition of THIS WEEK ON CAPITOL HILL with Tony Perkins, on the Salem Radio Network and Salem News Channel…sponsored by AARP.

‘So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause’

An estimated 40,000 people poured into a city on the Uruguay River on Saturday for Pope Leo XIV's first Mass in South America, as the pontiff sought to raise the profile of the Catholic Church in Uruguay, the region's most secular country.

The post Pope Leo Greeted by 40,000 Faithful During First South America Mass in Uruguay appeared first on Breitbart.

‘They were losing ground everywhere’

Environmental, social, and governance factors, including diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, continue to play a material role in corporate governance, reportedly driving trillions of dollars in investments. 

Shareholders and other corporate stakeholders likely assume these investments—such as net-zero commitments and employee resource groups that divide employees on the basis of race and sex—are subject to traditional screens like expected value and return-on-investment calculations.  

In fact, fiduciary duties arguably require investments to be vetted via expected value and ROI unless a good reason exists not to. Yet corporate ESG and sustainability reports rarely, if ever, even mention expected value or return on investment, leading to serious questions about how shareholders’ money is being spent on what are often ideologically driven agendas. 

While it may come as a surprise, when corporations waste money on ESG, the subsequent loss of shareholder value implicates (1) affordability, (2) the growing national security threat of China, (3) the rise of socialism, and even (4) the Islamification of the United States. 

First, if corporations “go woke, go broke” by wasting money on ESG investments, necessities become harder to afford for retirees relying on the stock performance of those companies. Likewise, when ESG investments take the form of DEI initiatives that discriminate on the basis of race and sex in the name of racist “equity,” the individuals left unemployed or underemployed because of such initiatives face similar affordability challenges.    

Second, ESG investments that undermine the energy independence of the United States via utopian “green” initiatives are notorious for strengthening China. For example, as I put it in September, “while net-zero commitments undermine U.S. energy independence, prosperity, and national security, China is not similarly limited,” which means U.S. corporate net-zero commitments may give China a leg up in its competition with the U.S. Relatedly, corporate DEI initiatives that divide employees on the basis of race and sex can undermine social cohesion in the U.S. in ways that China can take advantage of. 

Third, wasteful spending in the name of ESG may be deemed a form of crony capitalism, but when the consequent costs are mistakenly or purposefully improperly attributed to free market capitalism, the destructive specter of socialism grows. 

Finally, when ESG investments promote a nihilistic multiculturalism and a war on Western civilization and Christianity in the name of “inclusion,” the threat of Islamification of the United States similarly grows. 

The foregoing are just some of the costs arguably imposed on Americans via corporate ESG investments untethered from the market discipline of traditional expected value calculations or ROI. They help explain why one of the areas of focus for The Heritage Foundation’s American Investor Initiative is ESG ROI. Among other things, the initiative files shareholder proposals requesting ESG ROI transparency and negotiates related improvements in corporate disclosures.  

Even a seemingly open-ended statement that a corporation “may” consider expected value and ROI in making ESG investments can materially improve corporate disclosure and market accountability, if for no other reason than what such a statement does not say.  

For example, a corporation making such a statement could have said that calculating ESG ROI is impossible or that ESG ROI is irrelevant because all ESG investments are compliance cost centers. In fact, in a recent post on the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, my colleague Allen Mendenhall and I noted that “when we have offered to withdraw shareholder proposals if a company would state publicly that its sustainability commitments are legally required, companies have generally declined to do so.”  

Incremental disclosure improvements that take such objections to ESG ROI off the table—at least as across-the-board excuses—set the stage for further transparency and accountability. 

In the end, improving corporate accountability for ESG ROI benefits corporations, their shareholders, and other stakeholders, as well as free enterprise generally. Accordingly, more work needs to be done to improve corporate ESG ROI disclosures and accountability, and Heritage’s American Investor Initiative will continue to do that work. 

Cook County is attempting to have its Supreme Court firearms ban case dismissed after a named plaintiff requested withdrawal.

The post Cook County’s Last-Ditch Bid to Dodge SCOTUS Gun Ban Case appeared first on The Truth About Guns.

Emmanuel Macron is the least popular president in modern French history, according to a poll this week, after his approval rating has cratered over the recent weeks of riots consuming the nation.

The post Poll: Emmanuel Macron the Least Popular President in Modern French History at Just 13 Per Cent Support appeared first on Breitbart.

Melania Trump was headed to Louisiana on Saturday to announce a partnership between Louisiana State University and her "Fostering the Future" program to provide scholarships for LSU students who came through the foster care system. The first lady also planned to attend the...

On Aug. 14, 1774, the Rev. John Bullman climbed into the towering pulpit of Charleston’s St. Michael’s Church and told his South Carolina congregation that they needed to know their place. 

As tensions with Great Britain mounted, Bullman, St. Michael’s assistant rector, preached “The Christian Duty of Peaceableness.” 

He ridiculed the “silly Clown” and “illiterate Mechanic” who presumed to “censure the conduct of his Prince or Governor.” There was, Bullman declared, “no greater Instrument or Ornament of Peace” than for every man to keep “his own Rank” and perform the duties of his station. The congregation erupted. 

The next day, the vestry—the parish’s lay governing body—considered a sermon that had caused “great offence and exasperated many of the inhabitants.” Some parishioners threatened to leave the church; the controversy grew so heated that violence was feared. 

The vestry moved against Bullman almost immediately. By the following morning, he had been relieved of his position. He remained in Charleston for several months, hoping for reinstatement, before returning to England. 

Completed in 1761 at Charleston’s famous Four Corners, St. Michael’s was among colonial America’s grandest churches. Its 186-foot steeple dominated the skyline. Its pews held men who would help lead a revolution their ministers struggled to accept. Thomas Heyward Jr. and Thomas Lynch Jr. would sign the Declaration of Independence; Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, John Rutledge, and Pierce Butler would sign the Constitution. 

At nearby St. Philip’s, the Rev. Robert Smith reached a different conclusion about Christian duty and political resistance. In February 1775, he preached to South Carolina’s political leaders on a day of fasting and prayer amid the dispute with Britain. Smith defended the colonists’ cause as the “sole Defence of undoubted rights,” while urging them to examine their own conduct and acknowledge their dependence on God. He rejected the claim that resistance necessarily sprang from an “unreasonable thirst of power, or factious discontent.” 

Smith called his listeners to repentance and placed their cause under divine judgment, but he made clear that defending their rights could be consistent with Christian duty. Sixteen months later, he enlisted as a private to defend Charleston. 

The Church of England was intertwined with the British establishment, and its clergy had sworn allegiance to the Crown. Anglican worship included prayers for the king, a practice that became politically explosive as resistance turned toward revolution. 

Yet Anglicanism did not dictate one political position. Smith showed that a clergyman could defend the colonists’ rights while remaining a priest of the Church of England. For Bullman and other loyalist clergy, obedience to established authority was a religious obligation. As resistance hardened, Anglican priests faced a question of conscience: What did a clergyman owe the king when his congregation turned against him? 

Bullman chose loyalty to the Crown. Many parishioners did not. 

St. Michael’s rector, the Rev. Robert Cooper, also remained loyal. He refused to sign the Patriot association, join the militia, or take an oath of allegiance to South Carolina. 

By the summer of 1776, the dispute over allegiance was no longer confined to sermons and vestry meetings. It was about to be tested by cannon fire. 

The British Royal Navy opened fire on the unfinished palmetto-log fort on Sullivan’s Island. Among Col. William Moultrie’s defenders were Rev. Smith, my fifth-great-grandfather James Baggett, Catawba warriors, Francis Marion, William Jasper, Danger Thomson, and more than 1,200 other soldiers.  

Outnumbered by a British force of nearly 3,000 men and facing nine armed warships, Moultrie’s defenders endured hours of cannon fire and lost 12 men, but they ultimately repelled the Royal Navy’s assault. Charleston rejoiced!  

Christopher Gadsden, commanding at Fort Johnson across the harbor, sent Moultrie a message: “I congratulate you on the drubbing you gave those fellows.”  

Susannah Elliott sailed to Sullivan’s Island to congratulate the defenders, including her husband, Maj. Barnard Elliott, who had fought in the battle. She presented the Second South Carolina Regiment with two silk banners she had embroidered herself, praising their gallant defense of “Liberty & your country.” 

The victory at Sullivan’s Island made heroes of Charleston’s defenders. It also made neutrality increasingly impossible. 

As Moultrie’s men fought the British fleet on June 28, Cooper publicly prayed at St. Michael’s that God would strengthen George III to triumph over his enemies. 

Smith, however, returned to the pulpit at St. Philip’s on June 30 and hailed Charleston’s defenders. The contrast between the two clergymen could hardly have been clearer. One prayed for the king’s victory; the other thanked God for a Patriot triumph he had helped secure. 

This was too much for St. Michael’s vestry. On July 2, they dismissed Cooper for persisting in his allegiance to the Crown.  

That same day in Philadelphia, the Continental Congress declared that the colonies “are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.” Two days later, Congress adopted the Declaration explaining that decision. 

Bullman and Cooper may sincerely have believed that Christian duty required obedience to the Crown. But the question was not settled by sincerity alone. Political authority is not absolute, and resistance to earthly authority is not necessarily rebellion against God. 

Smith’s example offered another understanding of Christian responsibility. He defended the colonists’ rights while placing their cause under moral scrutiny. The Patriot conviction that government existed to secure liberties endowed by the Creator, rather than exercise unlimited authority over the people, gave many colonists a powerful moral argument for resistance. 

The dividing line in Charleston did not always run between denominations, or even between churches. Sometimes it ran straight down the aisle. 

In August 1774, Bullman climbed into one of colonial America’s grandest pulpits and told his congregation that peace required every man to keep his proper place. The people listening were about to help create a new country. 

They had no intention of staying in their place. 

This article is part of a series on the American Revolution in South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia.  

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of the Daily Signal

On Friday on Fox News Channel's "Jesse Watters Primetime," host Jesse Watters suggested the White House needs "more Darth Vader" as Democrats prepare to assume control of Capitol Hill in 2027.

The post FNC’s Watters: ‘Maybe We Need More Darth Vader in the White House’ appeared first on Breitbart.

Conan O'Brien waxed philosophical recently about politics in America today and insisted that modern politics rewards people with no soul.

The post WATCH: Conan O’Brien Says Vivek Ramaswamy Has ‘No Soul’ appeared first on Breitbart.