(Border Collie Belle is now 14, and laying at my feet.)

One Vermont reader sent me this encouraging email:

“Reading your book has had quite an impact on me, and I am grateful for such a concise and trenchant exposé of the sickness of our agricultural-food system. The quote at the end of the book that healthcare pays no attention to food and the food system pays no attention to health is searingly true....I have macabrely joked for years that they probably buy stock in one another’s industries to maximize their gain! (mostly at taxpayer expense...)”

I am pleased that readers who understand finance and money supply are learning how it connects to food and farming; and farmer readers tell me they are learning interesting facts about money supply and inflation and how they impact farming and food. I also invested a lot of research to explain what is happening to agricultural production in Europe and globally, and how this connects the dots to a globalist corporate cabal seeking to use NGOs, climate change, and lies about cows to implement a complete domination of food supplies.

Henry Kissinger is said to have believed, “Control the food, control the people.” What I document in this book is how the food is controlled by controlling the farmers. Our nation’s farmers continue to disappear. The average age of US farmers is about 61, and it is expected that about one half od all US farmland will change ownership in the next 15 years. This is a seismic shift in agricultural production: will corporations, hedge funds, and foreign nations become the principal owners of American farmland, or will a new generation of young people be encouraged and supported to take the reins of nurturing our food supplies. The stakes for future generations could not be higher.

If you have not read this book, please check out the powerful endorsements from some high-profile supporters and consider giving it a read. If you have bought my book, even if you have not finished it, I invite you to post a review here. The more detailed, the better.

These issues of food sovereignty and quality will not go away until we fix this crisis. Food = Liberty: both are currently under deliberate attack for power and profit. Please support my work — and America’s farmers and food supplies — by buying The Coming Food Crisis today, and posting a positive review.

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I have been receiving strong positive feedback from readers about my book, The Coming Food Crisis, which examines the hidden risks of the inexorable consolidation of the agriculture, food, and related industries upon which Americans depend for their daily bread.

The United States remains the world’s largest food exporter. However, in just the last few years, the US has become a net importer of food — we import more than we export!!

The farther food is shipped from its source, the more vulnerable its supply lines become. At the same time, incremental input costs for shipping, processing, fuels, fertilizers, pesticides, equipment, etc. have amplified the price sensitivity of food supplies to even modest increases in inflation, or sudden spikes in energy commodity prices (such as currently, given the Iran conflict).

Please read my book and share its content so more people become informed about the importance of local agriculture and local farmers in countering these growing perils.

Purchase my book!

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In the 2024 presidential election, Timothy Mellon was the largest individual contributor to the campaigns of both Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., serving as a lifeline to Kennedy’s courageous bid to challenge Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination while also starting a health revolution in America.

Mellon gave a stunning $151 million to Trump’s super PAC, and $25 million to PAC supporting Kennedy. He also provided significant financial backing for Children’s Health Defense, which until 2023 was chaired by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

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But who is Timothy Mellon?

When The New York Times published an article about him in 2025, reporting that he was the anonymous donor who gave $130 million to the U.S. government to pay the troops during the budget shutdown, the only photo they could find of him was from 1981.

Luckily, Mellon has written a book, PanAm. Captain, that reveals far more than that old picture; it tells a remarkable, picaresque life journey of adventure and learning.

Mellon recounts his childhood and school years in the 1950s, then moves on to his career as a pilot, including his stewardship as chairman of PanAm Systems for a time. He takes us to the halls of Yale University, to the skies as a pilot, and through marriages and business ventures.

He graduated from Yale and was admitted to Yale Law School, but quickly dropped out to study city planning and then switched again to immerse himself in computer programming.

Computer programming led Mellon into several business ventures until he settled on cutting and coating railroad ties. Soon, he jumped the tracks (literally) into the railroad business, buying up and streamlining various declining railroad companies. This, in turn, led him to purchase the former Pan Am airline franchise out of bankruptcy and eventually learn to fly the company’s 727s so he could serve as a pilot.

He built numerous homes in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Wyoming, as well as a Norwegian “loft” home made of pine logs, and a stave church patterned after historical Norwegian examples.

What matures from this journey is a worldview constructed not from classroom studies or elitist backroom dealings, but rather from a blue-collar work ethic and a disdain for unscrupulous gain. These lessons begin to coalesce in the later chapters as the author’s life lessons converge with his retelling.

The book’s underlying messages come slowly, but they’re worth the wait.

Mellon of course was born into the Mellon banking family, the grandson of Gilded Age financier and treasury secretary Andrew Mellon, but Timothy’s book doesn’t dwell on that. It focuses, rather, on his myriad experiences in life and his reflections on what he learned, including: standing up when believing he’s in the right; fighting hard to achieve success in risky business efforts; the importance of a work ethic; the value of collecting disparate skillsets; and his sense of duty to steward the environment.

Mellon also documents his life’s journey on moving vehicles: a Raleigh bicycle (that he bought for $96 with his savings); a blue 1960 Chevy BelAir; airplanes; a Jet Ranger helicopter; and later jets themselves – including a private Cessna, and a Boeing 727. As the book’s title suggests, Mellon would become a captain for PanAm in its heyday.

Political Awakenings

Mellon had been a lifelong Democrat, strongly influenced by the Kennedys and the Civil Rights movement. Disenchanted by the runaway spending and failed promises of the Democrats, he became a staunch supporter of conservative values and thus Republicans. He was strongly impressed by Ronald Reagan’s libertarian leanings and singularly unimpressed by unions’ ability to bankrupt railroads and airlines through bargaining power that destroyed profitability.

Mellon tells us where this shift in perspective arose: running businesses constantly harried by ubiquitous government regulations and cost impositions at the state, local, and federal levels. In a frank condemnation of the modern nanny state, Mellon makes the analogy between the institution of slavery and modern dependence on government: “But here we are, another two decades down the road, with a record number of citizens dependent upon government largess. They have become slaves of a new Master, Uncle Sam.”

Mellon voted for LBJ and Jimmy Carter, and thought Richard Nixon a scoundrel. His conversion did not arise from a silver spoon existence but from a roll-up-your-sleeves practicality. He believed in government as an ally until repeated experiences of graft, incompetence, and waste taught him a hearty dose of libertarian skepticism.

By 2014, Mellon had concluded that America was being torn apart by opportunistic parasites feeding off those who supported the economy and standard of living through their labors and integrity.

In view of the present national division between “woke” Democrats committed to defending illegal immigrants against traditional law enforcement, and Republicans seeking to boost the economy and cut down on government profligacy, Mellon’s characterization of these battle lines in 2014 is prescient: “The entire educational system has become part of the scam: the teachers’ unions perpetuate shoddy performance and foster changes in curriculum that emphasize the benefits of pandering and catering to the various groups that have been defined as victims of Capitalism.”

Mellon’s outspoken pivot to this worldview is neither anticipated by his storytelling nor surprising. Repeatedly, he recounts regulatory buffoonery that kills deals, extinguishes profits, interferes with business dealings, and hurts Americans. His effort to clear some trees at an airport resulted in a landslide of lawsuits; his business dealings were stymied by regulatory hurdles that rewarded and empowered bureaucrats with no demonstrable benefits to the public. (He reserves particular ire for Connecticut Attorney General, now U.S. Senator, Richard Blumenthal.)

The underlying message of PanAm.Captain is that integrity and fortitude are the mainstays of not only a meaningful individual life but also a healthy society. Mellon takes pride in creating jobs, improving business efficiency, preserving the hard work of past generations, and donating land to the government for perpetual trust (8,577 acres across three states).

“My endeavors in life, though not all related, I hope can be judged to have moved the World forward, even if only by a small measure,” he writes. “I have enjoyed overcoming each and every challenge that has been placed in my path, trying in each case to multiply the good resulting from its occurrence.”

And he expresses gratitude for having been born a Mellon, which gave him a head start in life.

“My life, I conclude, has been a fortunate journey,” he acknowledges. “I benefited from a first-class education. I have never been without a comfortable financial cushion, although I have always felt the need to use my own brainpower to augment what I started with…”

This is a story not just about one man’s past, but the choices facing all Americans. Timothy Mellon’s insights are not drawn from the exploits of a privileged trustfunder, but from the determination of an indefatigable entrepreneur. We can all learn from his life story.

[PanAm.Captain was published by Skyhorse Publishing and is available from Amazon in hardcover and for Kindle.]

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(Originally published at The MAHA Report.)

(Photo by Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images)

In the midst of unprecedented national division, Republicans and Democrats have apparently found something upon which they agree: that US moral values are “poor.” A May 1-17 Gallup survey offered a sobering assessment of Americans’ negative views of their country’s moral trajectory.

For Better or Worse

Gallup reported a 12-percentage-point increase (to 56%) from last year in the number of Americans who rate moral values in the United States as “poor,” a record high. The number of respondents who say moral values are “getting worse” rose 14 points, to 80%. Gallup has been conducting this inquiry since 2002.

This measure is limited by vagueness in how “moral values” are defined. Predictably, Republicans and Democrats differ on moral priorities and perspectives. As Gallup observed, “While Americans across party lines generally agree on the poor state of moral values in the U.S., they likely disagree about its meaning and causes.” It is also unclear whether this standard of “moral values” pertains to the public or to government policies.

In the history of the Gallup survey, Republicans have generally been more likely to rate the country’s moral values as poor than Democrats. Gallup reported:

“The gap was widest in 2024, when 73% of Republicans and 28% of Democrats held that view, a difference of 45 points. The pattern flipped last year following President Donald Trump’s return to office, with Democrats outpacing Republicans by 11 points.”

This dramatic pivot reflects the extent to which partisan alignment infuses Americans’ moral worldview. Similarly, the study found that “Republicans have led in pessimism about the trajectory of moral values, peaking at 97% in 2023, before dropping sharply to 39% in 2025 after Trump began his second term in office.” Yet regardless of political affiliation, Gallup notes this is “the first time in Gallup’s trend that majorities of all three groups have concurrently rated moral values as poor.”

Societal Rift and Diverging Moral Worldviews

Through the lens of growing socio-cultural rifts in the fabric of American society (likely sown by post-modernism, utilitarianism, secularism, and other sundry rejections of God), the world has never looked so morally gloomy. It’s just that the right and left differ on what is moral.

For many on the left, conservatives who oppose gay marriage, puberty blockers for minors, open borders, or Hamas are emblematic of immoral societal decay: homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, Zionism. Trump Derangement Syndrome fuels outrage against the president, and thus anyone who supports him – labeled racist Christian nationalists, misogynistic bigots, or evil subhumans – is viewed immoral. In this milieu, ICE agents are evil and illegal immigrants are victims.

On the conservative side, the gay rights movement, that was supposed to have been resolved with legalized gay marriage, has expanded into a rainbow of sexual orientations and gender identities, with children learning in school about a variety of sexual behaviors and considering the use of puberty blockers and surgeries. Conservatives view open borders as a reckless, immoral ideological position that endangers women and children. Supporting Hamas in the name of the Palestinian people seems heinous to many on the right, let alone justifying the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. BLM riots are not viewed as philanthropic.

Surely Americans can share in bipartisan moral disapprobation of Jeffrey Epstein and his clientele, public officials who commit sexual assault or harassment, bribery, fraud, and other offenses. Yet even these are often highly politicized: One man’s fraud is another man’s reparations; one woman’s bribery is another’s equity.

Church and State?

The Gallup poll revealed another striking partisan shift regarding how people viewed government involvement in promoting moral values. Republicans have consistently favored such participation for decades, but Democrats have swung powerfully the other way, a shift that has accelerated rapidly since Trump 2.0 began. Gallup reported:

“Democrats show the starkest contrast across the three readings, with 58% in favor in 1996, 43% in 2006 (during Republican George W. Bush’s presidency) and 29% today. Fully two-thirds of Democrats now say the government should not be involved.”

To conservatives, this smacks of hypocrisy. Teachers’ unions have used public school classrooms as moral pulpits for liberal causes for decades, including active shooter drills, birth control and abortion support, transgender “affirming care,” critical race theory, alphabet pride, climate alarmism, and patriarchy pitter-patter. BLM and pride flags grace many public school hallways, flagpoles, and classroom walls. All of these are moralizing; all are antithetical to traditional Christian positions; all have been undertaken in recent years by liberal edicts or actions.

Many young people are returning to orthodox Christianity, monogamy, and other worldviews held in disdain by the secular left. It may be that in the future, Gallup’s morality poll will see an upturn in moral optimism. However, the hope that Americans currently share a bipartisan agreement about the poor moral state of the nation fades when the opposing perspectives of moral codes are considered. Americans will never agree that the nation is becoming more moral if they can’t agree on what “moral” means.

(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)

Gage Skidmore

One of President Sleepy Joe’s last-minute Autopen pardon recipients, a narcotics dealer, just got arrested in Vermont...for dealing hardcore narcotics! The case reveals the travesty not just of Biden’s unpardonable pardons, but the death and destruction wrought by Democrat policies that are soft on crime and hard on public safety.

Todd “Rocky” Jarvis was one of 2,490 prisoners who received clemency from President Joe Biden three days before Biden left the White House, on January 17, 2025. A Bronx native, Jarvis oversaw a sophisticated crack cocaine and heroin distribution network that used middlemen disbursed throughout the Green Mountain State to sell drugs from residential locations.

Jarvis pleaded guilty in 2012 to conspiracy to distribute heroin and crack cocaine and was sentenced to nearly nineteen years in prison. Prosecutors noted Jarvis’s decades-long criminal record in drugs and related firearms offenses. Then–assistant U.S. attorney Christina Nolan wrote in 2010,

His record shows that, even on parole, the defendant reverts to this behavior. He implemented the charged conspiracy while on parole in New York State, and he is currently incarcerated on New York State parole violation charges stemming from a motor vehicle stop in which officers found a gun in his car.

Following a multi-year investigation, Jarvis was finally imprisoned, yet Biden’s pardon provided a get-out-of-jail-free card. However, Jarvis was still subject to post-release conditions under the Federal Court’s Re-Entry Initiative Program in Burlington, Vermont, where he allegedly tested positive in April 2026 for cocaine twice and heroin once. The end of the line came when the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) stepped in:

DEA’s surveillance revealed that Jarvis was associated with multiple drug-involved locations in the greater Burlington area, that Brown frequently accompanied him on visits to these drug-involved locations, and that Jarvis was making short-duration trips to New York City. These observations led law enforcement to interdict Jarvis on the evening of May 10, 2026, while he was returning to Vermont from New York City…. A search of Jarvis’ person revealed approximately 510 grams of suspected cocaine base and 24 grams of suspected fentanyl in his vest pocket.

Some people just can’t win for losin’. This is a common pattern for narcotics traffickers. The surveillance, monitoring, and apprehension of Jarvis is déjà vu for the arresting officers charged with protecting Vermonters from his dealings all over again, and for the prosecutors tasked with (yet again) ensuring he is incarcerated. Presumably, those publicly paid officials have other criminals they could be apprehending rather than re-arresting dangerous thugs Biden unleashed through his unfathomable pardons.

The Marxist mission to deconstruct America in order to impose a social justice Utopia employs not just commie Berkeley professors, but drag queens reading books to children in public schools, national borders opened to criminal gangs, Somali fraudsters diverting federal dollars from those in need, and overt systemic racism disguised as equity. Apparently, it also includes releasing hardened criminals back into society.

Biden’s pardons resemble a domestic Mariel boatlift, with Anthony Fauci and Hunter Biden as stowaways. Perhaps that was exactly the plan: Todd Jarvis is supposed to wreak havoc in Vermont.

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(Originally published at American Thinker.)

(Photo by: Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

The widespread cultural divide among Americans was evident in a recent First Amendment case in Washington. A Christian foster family from the Evergreen State said their speech and religious liberties were violated by state policies demanding they employ gender pronouns and affirm the sexual orientation of their foster charges. The resulting settlement seeks to protect religious liberties while also supporting the self-identification of gender, orientation, etc., by minors in need of an affirming home.

Brave Foster Plaintiffs

Shane and Jennifer DeGross are devout Christians who served as licensed foster parents in Washington from 2013 to 2022, caring for four children. The onslaught of trans ideology and a world in which toddlers allegedly proclaim their “true” gender yielded regulations in Washington and many other states that required foster parents to agree that they would “affirm” a child’s sexual orientation, gender identity, and expression (called “SOGIE”), regardless of whether a particular child actually articulated any such desires. That is, the laws are imposed “just in case” a child decides to transition or declare themself gay, bi, trans, etc.

The DeGrosses told the truth to state employees: They could not agree to such restrictions because they believe that “a person’s biological sex is an immutable characteristic” and that “as image bearers of God, a person should live consistent with their God-given sex rather than contrary to God’s design.” The state of Washington then denied them a license, later issuing a limited license, which the couple still found hostile to their faith.

The DeGrosses brought suit in federal court with the assistance of Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), alleging the state had violated their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion and expression. The state sought to dismiss the complaint, alleging the plaintiffs had no legitimate cause of action. Ruling in favor of the plaintiffs, the court stated:

“....Policy § 1520 restricts certain speech by prospective parents on the topic of SOGIE, while requiring speech that aligns with the state’s perspective…. In essence, the Department has forced the DeGrosses to choose between forfeiting their freedom of speech to obtain an unrestricted license, or upholding their beliefs surrounding SOGIE, and receiving a less-favorable license subject to certain restrictions. The DeGrosses have carried their burden to show that the Department’s enforcement of Policy § 1520 plausibly constitutes impermissible viewpoint discrimination.”

Freedom of Religion Endures

The US Constitution is designed to prevent government intrusion into citizens’ subjective beliefs, particularly regarding religious or political views. State foster care services place agencies in the midst of the culture war created by novel theories about mutable gender, infinite pronouns, and endless prideful celebration of sexual behaviors. Some parents may wish to encourage such thinking and behaviors in very young children; some (including conservative Christians) are inclined otherwise. In seeking to split this proverbial baby in half for foster parenting, the court noted: “The situation would be no different if the state had restricted parental speech favoring more ‘progressive’ views of sexuality and gender identify, while compelling speech along the lines of [the DeGrosses’] more traditional understanding.” [citation omitted.]

Because the state had essentially taken sides in a culture war, and this position was hostile to the beliefs of many people of faith, the foster parent regulation was “facially” unconstitutional. That means it blatantly violates constitutional protections. Quoting from the seminal US Supreme Court case of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the Washington federal district court ruled that if the state is to “respect the Constitution’s guarantee of free exercise,” it “cannot impose regulations that are hostile to the religious beliefs of affected citizens and cannot act in a manner that passes judgment upon or presupposes the illegitimacy of religious beliefs and practices.”

The legal effect of the court’s ruling was to greenlight the DeGrosses’ lawsuit for monetary damages for violation of their First Amendment liberties. However, the parties subsequently reached a settlement agreement approved by the court that requires the state of Washington to pay $250,000 in legal fees to ADF and replace the offending foster parent regulation with rules that protect religious liberties. Interestingly, the new rules will place ultimate decision-making in the state Department of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF) as to where individual children will be placed. DCYF will place gay or trans children in homes that do not embrace conflicting religious views. The settlement agreement stipulates: “When a foster parent, for whatever reason, cannot meet a child’s needs, including SOGIE, DCYF can decide not to place with that foster parent.”

A Return to Sanity

That is what should have been implemented at the outset, rather than imposing a moral (immoral?) litmus test on Christian foster families relating to straight children who are not confused about their gender. The very fact that states like Washington take a secular position on this issue and force a controversial and unproven ideology on citizens reveals the grotesque unconstitutionality identified by the courts. Those who scoff at claims of government discrimination against Christians should take note.

Washington is struggling with serious failures in its foster care system for tort claims alleging historic abuse. In 2025, the state paid out $499 million in tort claims for past abuse by foster parents. Perhaps the state will now benefit from Christian foster parents willing to serve, rather than stigmatize them as ignorant or intolerant and deny them the ability to care for needy children.

Parents who simply claim “a person’s biological sex is an immutable characteristic” should now have the liberty to be licensed as foster care providers, regardless of whether they hold that view as a faith issue or as fundamentalist biology and chromosome science. Foster parents comfortable with “affirming” a child’s desire for potentially dangerous puberty blockers, or their declaration at age five that they are gay or bi, can still do so.

This settlement outcome strikes the balance that should have been built into state regulations of foster care from the start. As the “real science” of transgender ideology continues to be studied, it may be that American society one day achieves a consensus once long held as inviolate: that young children should not be conditioned to focus on their sexuality and gender identity as the highest goals of life. Until then, at least those who embrace this view will not be discriminated against by government bureaucrats enamored with bizarre and dangerous theories du jour.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.”

Health & Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., said he strongly supports the EPA’s new tack. “I’ve read a couple of articles in the corporate media that suggest that EPA is trying to roll back PFAS regulations. It’s not true. I’ve met repeatedly with Lee and his staff and they’re completely committed to end the exposures in a way that’s legal and practical.”

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Kennedy continued, “As Lee pointed out, the Biden administration passed a [regulation] very hastily in which they ignored a Clean Water Act mandate for a public comment period . . . I can tell you, that was a fatal flaw.”

The HHS Secretary added that the Biden regulation wouldn’t withstand a court challenge and would be thrown out. “We’re doing it in a way that maintains the … maximum contaminant Safe Drinking Act levels, and gives maximum protection as quickly as possible for the American public.”

Despite widespread criticism from the legacy media and many in the MAHA base, I agree with Secretary Kennedy: the recent EPA policy shift signals an acceleration of PFAS cleanup, not a dangerous step backward.

Here’s why: “PFAS” is a catch-all term for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, a large group of chemicals characterized by carbon-fluorine bonding, creating resilient substances that resist heat, oil, and water. (Their capacity to persist in the environment, including by accumulating in the human body, has earned them the nickname “forever chemicals”) Ironically, these fluorochemicals were developed by scientists for the Manhattan Project. Later applications led to Teflon frying pans and numerous other uses, including in food packaging, dental floss, and fire retardants. PFAS are now ubiquitous and present in most humans’ bodies.

Corporations, including 3M, scandalously covered up the known dangers of PFAS to human health, causing decades of delay in remediation. As with all potentially toxic or harmful substances, it is generally much harder to clean them up once released into the ecosystem than to prevent their generation at inception. Meanwhile, many important U.S. industries have become dependent on the molecular properties of PFAS for various manufacturing applications.

It is now well-known that PFAS inflict a myriad of health harms on humans, including undermining immune system function. Some 15,000 PFAS have been identified: the recent EPA rules for drinking water govern merely six.

There are regulatory and logistical parallels between the recent PFAS decision and the desire by supporters of the MAHA agenda to eliminate glyphosate and other herbicides. It isn’t as easy as snapping fingers or voting for Kennedy. Nor is it as simple as reversing the industrial capture of regulatory agencies. The EPA has laws to follow, and can’t unilaterally ignore them.

This is especially true since the U.S. Supreme Court’s Loper Bright decision, which pared back administrative discretion to implement broad regulations unauthorized by Congress. EPA Administrator Zeldin’s awareness of this new constraint was on display during a feisty congressional sparring with Connecticut’s Democrat Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro. Loper Bright requires federal agencies, including the EPA, to comply closely with federal law.

But the conflicts over eliminating glyphosate and PFAS are different in a number of key respects. The EPA has previously determined that glyphosate is not carcinogenic, and the battle lines there are driven by the pursuit of scientific evidence demonstrating its carcinogenicity or other health harms. However, the EPA completely agrees that PFAS are harmful and must be closely regulated.

In a May 18 press release announcing the PFAS policy shift relating to drinking water, Administrator Zeldin stated that the EPA is “taking on PFAS the right way,” including “action to stop PFAS pollution at the source before it ever reaches a tap.” But Zeldin, like Kennedy, has identified failures in statutory compliance in past EPA regulations that expose the agency to legal challenges he seeks to foreclose.

Detractors focused on the ideal outcome – the elimination of all PFAS from drinking water – but ignored the pragmatic hurdles that EPA must address. These include compliance with federal law, identifying the evolving technologies that can effectively extricate PFAS from drinking water, and providing funding support for communities to implement remediation efforts. This is where idealism collides with pragmatism.

For example, one accomplished toxicologist identified by The New York Times as a MAHA activist, alleged that Zeldin is “laser-focused on eliminating regulations” and asked, “Why not defend this rule in court and see what the judge thinks?” Her good intentions collide with legal and economic realities: if Zeldin waits and a court strikes down the current scheme, effective remediation could be set back years. Instead, Zeldin has announced two proposed rules to remedy legal deficiencies and prioritize effective implementation: he is not eliminating PFAS drinking water regulations; he is “laser-focused” on repairing their clear failings.

I’ve seen the rabid diatribes denouncing the EPA’s decision, and most mischaracterize the consequences of the new rules, claiming the EPA is blocking water clean-up. But as I wrote in a commentary two years ago, the Biden era rules foisted most of the clean-up costs for PFAS onto the communities most harmed. It also seemed oblivious to the lack of effective available technologies to extricate these chemicals from water supplies.

The Biden administration implemented rules to regulate six PFAS in drinking water. In its recent proposed revisions of EPA regulations, the EPA announced two rules to improve the effort. The first governs PFOA and PFOS, extending the compliance deadline by up to two years for entities struggling to implement cleanup technologies, while holding other waterworks to the current timeline. This sensible approach acknowledged the funding and technological hurdles ignored by the previous rule, and addresses both.

The second proposed rule applies to the other four PFAS targeted by the Biden EPA, but pauses implementation to cure for a failed Biden-EPA process that violated the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA).

The agency has already been sued for failing to comply with the SDWA, including a failure to solicit public comments. The proposed new rule will relaunch the evaluation of these PFAS while complying with the Act. As the EPA notes in its press release, this will allow recent research on these PFAS to be scrutinized and could lead to “more stringent requirements” for them. The process will provide industry with greater predictability, the public with a legally required comment period, and shield the EPA from obvious, process-based legal challenges.

This is a quick fix, much preferable to defending an indefensible rule in court and having it thrown out months or years from now.

Activists love to attack the EPA, but let’s examine what the EPA is doing well regarding PFAS in drinking water. For one thing, the agency is focusing on source policing to prevent release. For another, it has identified a logjam of federal funding for PFAS clean-up at the state administrative level.

The agency also launched its “PFAS OUT [reach]” program, designed to provide technical advice to struggling rural communities and ensure they have access to funding. As EPA notes, “The EPA is committed to ensuring this grant funding reaches small and disadvantaged systems that face unique challenges.” The EPA has also streamlined its periodic review of available proven remediation technologies through the PFAS Destruction & Removal Guidance, which will now issue guidance annually rather than every three years.

Perhaps most importantly, the Trump administration’s EPA is substantially boosting the real-world impact of federal financial support for affected water systems to implement required interventions. Billions of additional PFAS remediation dollars are now being provided through the Emerging Contaminants in Small or Disadvantaged Communities (ECSDC) Grant Program, $1.6 billion in Drinking Water State Revolving Funds specifically allocated to PFAS, and $7 billion in low-interest financing through the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA).

Prior Biden administration efforts also provided funding, but failed to follow through to ensure that federal dollars got to water systems that have been left holding the bag for PFAS cleanup. This essentially created unfunded mandates – imposing cleanup requirements on marginalized communities instead of the corporations that emitted the pollution. This was hardly equitable. As EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has previously announced, “We believe at the EPA under President Trump that we should be adopting a polluter pays model for cleaning up PFAS.”

Rushing regulations, pushing taxpayer dollars out the door without oversight, and ignoring what’s happening on the ground is a progressive policy initiative. Improving outreach, research, and funding also reduces overall compliance costs, which some sources estimate could exceed $100 billion for PFAS in drinking water. Imposing these costs on the communities most harmed by PFAS pollution was unconscionable.

Contrary to the doom-and-gloom cacophony of complaints that the EPA is somehow abandoning its oversight of PFAS in drinking water, the opposite is demonstrably the case. The EPA is advancing remediation funding, technical support, and advice to municipalities, and has expanded its own research arm, which studies both PFAS detection and elimination technologies. This is an all-out assault on currently identified PFAS and a blueprint for addressing the thousands of others yet to be evaluated.

As Jessica Kramer, EPA Assistant Administrator for the Office of Water, explained to the MAHA Report, “We are going to follow the law in our rulemakings, follow the science in our rulemakings, get this new money out the door, but we are also gonna make sure that the money that is already out the doors is gonna get to the communities that need it because no amount of additional money matters if you can’t get the money out of the door.”

This is why the EPA’s press release framed the joint announcement of the plan with HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a “PFAS destruction event.”

There is no quick fix for forever chemicals.

Secretary Kennedy and the EPA have not sold out to Big Chem. On the contrary, the MAHA movement is having a profound impact on the EPA and other regulatory agencies. No, they can’t deliver all the desired goods overnight. But they are listening, and working hard to earn public trust and navigate a complex labyrinth of technocratic rules.

Indeed, this very dispute serves to educate even more Americans about the dangers of PFAS. Much like food dyes, critics must explain: Why wasn’t this done decades ago? But here’s the thing – it’s being done now.

For their part, MAHA supporters would do well to look past the legacy media attack machine and consider the regulatory obstacles the EPA faces. They would also do well to think of the long game and remain trusting and committed to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the movement he continues to inspire.

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(Originally published at The MAHA Report.)

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Even among those who agree with Secretary Kennedy, there’s a lot of confusion about meat – specifically, grass-fed versus grain-fed options.

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In its new Dietary Guidelines for Americans (also known as My Plate, or the “food pyramid”), the USDA advises to “prioritize nutrient-dense foods and home-prepared meals.” Instead of high-carb diets, the new guidelines suggest increased intake of healthy fats and proteins, stating, “Prioritize high-quality, nutrient-dense protein foods as part of a healthy dietary pattern.”

And after decades of warning Americans that eggs are unhealthy and to be avoided, the new recommendations endorse “a variety of protein foods from animal sources, including eggs, poultry, seafood, and red meat.” This dramatic shift in the food pyramid reflects the powerful underlying cultural changes being achieved by the MAHA movement.

But what about beef? Yes, the new guidelines tell us to eat more meat, a terrific source of protein, but doesn’t it matter how the cows from which that meat comes were raised? Many people claim that grass-fed meats are superior to grain-fed options because they are healthier, more environmentally sustainable, and provide farm animals with happier lives. All three of these claims are true – with some qualifiers.

Let me explain: The backdrop for this controversy is several converging narratives that target our ancient bovine allies for removal from the human food chain: climate change, animal welfare, and human health. As a grass-fed beef farmer who has studied this issue for decades (and as an attorney well versed in logical persuasion), allow me to demonstrate the false premises behind all three of these justifications used to slander cows.

The Climate Change Narrative

Remember when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez proclaimed a war on cow farts as part of the Green New Deal? So-called climate scientists had been claiming this for decades. This laughable lie about our cow allies has also been taken up by Greta Thunberg, Bill Gates, the WEF, Al Gore, and John Kerry.

Yet, rotationally grazed cows sequester far more carbon dioxide and methane in the soil than “rewilded” forests do, and exponentially more than hybrid cars. Beyond the fart focus, one needn’t be a farmer to understand that all those plants that are supposed to replace cows require fertilizers. Manure is a natural fertilizer that rebuilds soils, feeds soil microbes, and breaks down industrial toxins in the process. (Hybrid cars, not so much.) Synthetic fertilizers pollute far more than cows, destroy soils, increase water loss, and sequester zero carbon dioxide. (Urea is made from natural gas, aka methane.)

But it’s worse than that. The globalists and multinational corporations claim that industrial agriculture, employing GMO technologies, is the “only way to save the world” from climate change. Yet GMO crops are dependent on glyphosate (a weed killer against which GMO crops have genetic immunity), synthetic fertilizers, and numerous pesticides. All of these deplete soils of nutrients, accelerate erosion, and increase water loss. How is this better than cows? Answer: It isn’t. Not in a million years!

Note also that AOC did not declaim non-food practices that visibly do hurt the environment, such as mowing hundreds of millions of acres of lawns using fossil fuels, flying around in jets, tooling mowed greens in golf carts, or being carted up a mountain to ski back down (on man-made snow, sucked using fossil fuels from depleted trout brooks). Even if climate change is caused by human action, these supposed cures all exhibit tell-tale signs of fraud: fear used to solicit massive funding for industrial “solutions” that pollute far more than they are peddled to replace.

Once upon a time, Americans focused on carcinogens and endocrine disrupters when evaluating pollution, not innocuous carbon dioxide. For instance, cows do not generate the chemical pollution produced by the lithium mining and excess rubber tire consumption required for that hybrid cars. The MAHA movement has renewed public focus on toxins, microplastics, and food quality. Cow flatulence is not the problem.

The Animal Welfare Narrative

All people should be concerned about animal welfare, but not all farm animals are subjected to factory housing, hormones, or routine administration of antibiotics. Many animal rights activists assert that humans should not eat or profit from any animals. This is an argument not for better lives for farm animals, but for no life at all.

I have raised beef cows for 25 years, and they are never without food, water, and shelter. If humans stop eating beef, my cows will be out of a job and out of a life. Right now, my females (cows) live a long life, and the bulls are sold for meat or breeding to pay for the mothers’ feed. Cows eat a LOT, so it is not feasible to keep them as pets.

The oldest recorded lifespan for a cow is just shy of 49 years, by an Irish cow named Big Bertha. There are over 86 million cows in the United States – they cannot all live in zoos, but if the animal rights crowd has their way, that is the only place humans will see cows in the future. (Meanwhile, their landscape views will widely disappear as fields regrow and there are no more cows to watch ruminating pleasurably on hillsides.)

The Human Health Narrative

There will always be debates about the relative merits of vegetarian or vegan versus meat-eating diets, in part because one diet doesn’t fit all humans. Some people are lactose- or meat-intolerant: pregnant, elderly, or lactating women especially benefit from the nutrient density of wholesome meats.

The evidence that red meat is bad for humans is largely linked to preservatives (processed meats are less healthy) and carcinogens emitted during cooking. There is no question that red meat also contains numerous healthy nutrients – it is not true that eating meat is bad for human health.

Neither is it necessarily true that a vegan diet is superior. In addition to the well documented potential for plant-only diners to suffer from various nutrient deficiencies, many plant-based offerings are highly processed and unhealthy.

Consider that plant-based meat substitutes are almost all manufactured using GMO monoculture crops (particularly soy, corn, and oats) tainted with glyphosate and other chemicals, to which are added the usual myriad of food “additives” to enhance flavor, stimulate appetite, etc. Just because something is made from plants does not automatically make it healthier. Grass-fed hamburger is far healthier than many of the chemical-laden replacements the corporate world has concocted to replace it.

Grass-fed Beef Studies

Grain-fed livestock grow faster than animals raised on grass-only, but they are largely dependent on the corn and soy GMO monoculture crops that are in turn chemical-dependent. In addition, grass-fed feeding proponents argue that the meat from grass-fed animals is healthier than grain-fed.

Studies consistently show that properly managed grass-fed beef production yields healthier products for consumers. A March 2026 study concluded: “Animals finished on biodiverse pastures exhibited fatty acid profiles characterized by higher omega-3 to total polyunsaturated FA content, resulting in a higher omega balance (r = 0.30, P = 0.02).”

This and other studies found variations in nutrient content, likely linked to soil health and the specific practices employed. Not everything labeled grass-fed is truly raised on grass. However, the overall picture shows that grass-fed beef and other grass-fed meats are higher in nutrients and healthy fats than their grain-fed counterparts.

An anecdotal example of the benefits of grass-fed beef has been provided by MAHA supporter Dr. Eric Berg, who employs regenerative soil conditioning practices on his Virginia farm. Dr. Berg had his meat tested by leading nutrition scientists. The testing concluded that his beef was especially high in phytochemicals, naturally occurring plant-derived compounds that may offer strong antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits. Some of the Berg samples achieved extremely high phytochemical scores. The testing report noted: “This total phytochemical score was 4.3-fold greater in the Berg samples than the amount we typically observe in grass-fed beef samples and 8-fold higher than the grain-fed average.”

Soil health and plant diversity appear to be the chief determinants of animal nutrient content. Grass-fed meats, if ethically and regeneratively raised, consistently provide healthier options for meat eaters.

Consumer Demand and Farm Economics

Consumers want healthier foods, and they have learned that grass-fed meats contain more nutrients and are unlikely to contain antibiotic or hormone residues. Many consumers are not interested in meat or milk substitutes. Many vegans are realizing that plant-based substitutes can often be very unhealthy and highly processed. Young people are leading the way in this dietary preference.

The U.S. imports organic meats that it could grow on its own shores. America is not currently able to meet the domestic or foreign demand for grass-fed meats: this is a huge economic opportunity for U.S. farmers who genuinely implement regenerative practices, rotational grazing, and grass-fed practices.

Yes, Grass-fed is Best!

So, whether it is to protect the environment, improve human health, enhance animal welfare, or grow the economy, grass-fed animal husbandry is the best path forward.

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(Originally published at the MAHA Report.)

Anthony Fauci — (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

The world has struggled for years to accurately determine whether the COVID virus originated naturally (that is, in the open-air markets of China) or was created by human hands at the Wuhan Institute of Virology using US taxpayer funding. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has long claimed that the truth has been deliberately covered up. Today (May 13), the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs (chaired by Paul) will conduct an inquiry to dig deeper through the testimony of an unnamed whistleblower.

The Origin Dispute

Though many critics of Paul assert that this is old news, and the senator should focus on more pressing current crises, the issue of COVID-19’s origins is akin to solving the riddle of the “magic bullet” theory of the assassination of John F. Kennedy – it will never go away. And Paul is as tenacious as a hound dog on a chicken bone.

The focal point of the COVID origins dispute has been the words and conduct of Dr. Anthony Fauci. Vilified by the vaccine-hesitant and praised by the vaccine-enamored, Fauci is a lightning rod of controversies, the most prominent of which is whether he and other federal government officials were responsible for the creation of the deadly virus and covered up that truth by blaming its origins on wet markets in Wuhan.

This conspiracy theory (or fact) has been exponentially boosted by the recent indictment of Dr. David Morens, who served as a senior adviser to Fauci at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Morens faces three felony charges, including conspiracy against the United States and deliberate concealment, destruction, or falsification of federal records. Prosecutors allege in the indictment that Morens and his co-conspirators falsified records and knowingly concealed information in an effort to suppress alternative theories regarding the origins of COVID.

The Genesis of COVID

The prosecution of Morens does not hinge on proof that COVID was created in a laboratory using gain-of-function technologies and resources: His conduct of unlawfully concealing communications from freedom of information or other reporting requirements is not dependent on such a finding. However, the motives for the alleged concealment will doubtless feature prominently in the ongoing investigation and prosecution, as will the inquiry into whether taxpayer dollars were used to mutate pathogens for gain-of-function research.

Paul has been an outspoken critic of Fauci and others, who, he asserted, engaged in a deliberate conspiracy to conceal documents revealing that COVID-19 was created in a laboratory, not in a Chinese wet market as has often been alleged. Paul wrote on X:

“For years, I warned that Fauci and his inner circle buried the truth about Wuhan. Now his closest adviser [Morens] has been indicted … He lied to Congress about NIH funding dangerous gain-of-function research in Wuhan and engaged in the worst cover-up in modern medical history. The American people want Fauci behind bars.”

Rand Paul on the Hunt

The prominent libertarian senator has for years suggested that Fauci lied to Congress about the origins of the pandemic outbreak. With the arrest of Morens, Paul claims he now has the goods to prove his allegations. Today’s hearing, titled “Whistleblower Testimony on the COVID Cover-up,” promises to platform an as-yet-unnamed witness who will further bolster Paul’s claims. In an X post as cryptic as it is ominous, Paul promised: “The truth is coming.”

Years have passed since the events underpinning these allegations transpired, but the stakes for public trust in federal agencies and vaccine interventions have never been higher. The entire premise of studies in virology is that they are undertaken to protect long-term human health. If the COVID virus was indeed manufactured in a Chinese laboratory, the devastating pandemic and resulting deaths, loss of liberties, and economic destruction will be laid at the feet of bad actors who, using taxpayer dollars, sickened taxpayers, then covered it up to save their skins.

A great many scandals have been rocking American news headlines in 2026, including alleged Somali daycare fraud, home healthcare scams, congressional improprieties, and Jeffrey Epstein revelations. Morens has not been convicted of a crime, and Fauci is shielded by a pre-emptive pardon issued by President Joe Biden (or his autopen). However, if Paul’s unnamed whistleblower sings a believable tune at the committee hearing, a multi-billion-dollar industry claiming to protect humanity by experimenting with wild viruses may face the greatest indictment of all.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)

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A Long List of Biden Transgressions

Americans have heard previously about the high-profile Biden administration efforts to use the FBI to spy on traditional Latin Mass Catholic groups, leveraged in part by many Catholic groups’ designation as hate groups by the now-disgraced Southern Poverty Law Center. Yet the report, titled “Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias within the Federal Government,” chronicles far more illegal infringements from numerous federal agencies, including outrageous fines against Christian universities levied by the Department of Education, aggressive DOJ prosecutions against non-violent pro-life demonstrators, IRS investigations of conservative churches for expressing biblical teachings, HHS rules that prevented conservative Christians from serving as foster families, denial of equal access to federal programs and benefits, violation of conscience for healthcare workers, limitations on employee freedom of expression, and the removal by the State Department of Nigeria from its list of countries of particular concern for religious freedom.

The report is voluminous (208 pages) because the list of documented offenses against people of conservative faith by the Biden administration is lengthy. The Trump administration has announced policies to reverse these unconscionable transgressions against the First Amendment, restoring liberties to express one’s faith – even of the liberal persuasion – freely.

Efforts to dismiss the report are shallow reminders of Biden’s gaslighting of people of faith. In a laughable condemnation of the report, Baptist Global News solicited a bevy of so-called “experts” for their take. The resulting screed reads like a social justice manifesto twinned with Trump Derangement Syndrome. It portrays the comprehensive report as the product of Christian nationalism while attacking Donald Trump’s personal religious views.

Experts With No Clothes

One “expert,” Melissa Rodgers, who led Biden’s faith-based initiatives, claims Joe Biden was “a devout Catholic” while dismissing the term “traditional Christian” as a major error in the study because it attributes a unified worldview to that category (though she never defines “devout”). Rodgers claims that “DOJ’s assertion of a ‘Christian worldview’ on contested policies amounts to taking sides on theological beliefs “which is something the government should never do.” Yet this is precisely what the extensive report concludes the Biden administration did, comprehensively and throughout numerous federal agencies – push a liberal worldview supporting pride flags, abortion, and transgender ideology at the deliberate expense of competing moral views.

Rodgers dismissed any logs in Biden’s eye while pointing at twigs in Trump’s, reportedly stating: “Those concerned about a president’s attack on faith should consider Donald Trump’s tirade against Pope Leo XIV, his AI-generated self-portrayal of himself as Christ, and his Easter Sunday social media warning.” This serves instead as an indictment of Biden by contrast – the April 30 report does not criticize President Biden for his personal views, but for what he implemented to quell the views of others – no such claim is leveled against the Trump administration.

The article invokes the Christian nationalism canard, quoting Amanda Tyler for the position that the report erroneously invoked “the mythology of the U.S. as a ‘Christian nation,’ a false narrative created to privilege Christianity in policy and law.” What that has to do with Biden’s conduct is simply avoided. Next, the scapegoat tactic of projection onto Trump is employed classically by pseudo-expert Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons (former leader of a “Christians Against Christian Nationalism” campaign), who proclaimed, “The greatest threat to Christians exercising our religious liberty in the United States today is the Trump administration itself.” If ever there was an example of critics “who doth protest too much,” this disjointed effort at a hit piece takes the Shakespearean cake.

President Trump Restores Religious Liberties

Such shallow screeds fail to deflect from the facts of Biden’s comprehensive assaults against conservative Christians documented in the report. The narrative runs aground even more visibly on the report’s stated reversals of these unconstitutional Biden policies under Donald Trump. It states:

BQ

“While the focus of the Task Force’s investigation is the effects of this bias on Christians, these affronts to the constitutional rights of the nation’s largest faith community pose equal, if not graver, risks to every faith tradition. As President Trump has explained, the Administration is committed to “vigorously enforc[ing] the historic and robust protections for religious liberty enshrined in Federal law.”6 This report provides a deep dive into the Task Force’s findings of anti-Christian bias and outlines the steps each member Department is taking to better protect the religious liberty of Americans of all faiths.”

EBQ

As much as the report serves as an alarming indictment of a “whole-of-government approach” under the Biden administration to prejudice and target conservative Christian believers, it is also a reaffirmation that the US government under the Trump administration will not do so. Trump is not dispatching surreptitious FBI undercover agents to infiltrate mosques or Satanic worship services. This marks just one more example of the Trump administration restoring constitutional protections systematically dismantled by the Biden administration.

Thank God!

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(Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

As the surreal ordeal of the global COVID-19 pandemic recedes further into the past, increasing criticism has been leveled at state and federal government responses to the outbreak. Faced with the threat of a potentially deadly disease, America’s most powerful government institutions implemented controversial policies that were counterproductive to overall long-term health. But learning from past mistakes may help prevent them from recurring in future crises.

Learning From Failures

Rates of death from COVID-19 have plummeted, yet many citizens still wear masks routinely or line up to receive an mRNA vaccine. In the high-pressure melee of the pandemic, Americans traded possible adverse effects from experimental vaccines against the perceived risk of death from COVID-19. Yet it is now abundantly clear that those shots were neither as safe nor as effective as advertised. Myocarditis, especially in young men, was just one of a myriad of potential adverse health harms posed by COVID-19 “interventions.” But many other health harms also intervened, and the toll is still being tallied.

Business closures mandated by public COVID-19 edicts crushed the US economy and disproportionately harmed small businesses. School closures adversely impacted schoolchildren. Masks, social distancing, and curtailing of public gatherings all extracted societal costs and often impinged on constitutional rights. Much like a post-hurricane disaster survey, the nation continues to reckon with the full extent of these costs.

These lessons raise the prospect of accountability for past failures and the potential for learned wisdom to guide future public policy. If the hantavirus began to spread rapidly from person to person, would America repeat its response to the COVID-19 pandemic? If not, what might the country do differently next time?

Adverse Impacts on Children

Closing down public and private schools proved a profound failure. Minor children were never at high risk from COVID-19; their grandparents were. The hypothetical fear that children would be disease vectors to teachers and others never panned out. The threat of child infection might be different with hantavirus or another disease, but clearly, school closures were a terrible policy under the COVID-19 scourge.

Children were subjected to a barrage of adverse impacts during the pandemic. Their parents were anxious, and most children were forced to curtail normal play, social events, and rites of childhood passage while their lives were put on a stressful hold. Numerous studies have established that these deprivations inflicted adverse effects on mental health and educational attainment. Additionally, socioeconomic disparities between disadvantaged and affluent children widened sharply – low-income kids fared the worst.

This sowed a long-term drag on the economy: Scientists predict there will likely be huge future economic costs from the extended isolation and anxiety experienced by millions of children whose education and development were disrupted. Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are known contributors to future struggles with mental health, drug abuse, and socialization, and can alter mood, behavior, brain development, and overall well-being.

The national economy stumbled sharply, during the pandemic, plunging many children and families into poverty, undermining healthy diets, and inflicting financial stress. Social distancing, masking, and restrictions on public gatherings (including church attendance, proms, graduation parties, and other socializing milestones) all caused alienation and anxiety, especially for young children. Studies show facial recognition and expressions are integral to infant development and communication.

Masking was never proven to curb disease spread effectively, but it certainly inhibited normal social maturation. Moreover, masks interfere with normal respiration and increase rebreathing of carbon dioxide, and disposable masks routinely expose wearers to chemical toxins contained in the masks themselves. A South Korean study “found that disposable masks, including medical-grade N95 masks, released eight times the recommended safety limit for toxic volatile organic compounds (TVOCs).”

Unsanitized COVID-19 Legacy

Additional adverse health impacts included the widespread use of sanitizers and sterilizing cleaning chemicals. As Children’s Health Defense recently reported, COVID-19 cleaning protocols permanently compromised many Americans’ health, especially from “quats” – quaternary ammonium compounds, which a March study from the University of California Davis found “may be far more harmful” if breathed in than swallowed.

Americans swallowed a lot during the COVID-19 crisis. Still, they have become more cautious about trusting “experts” whom they now know were just making up protocols like social distancing and masking as they went along, then bottling these fickle policies up in the dubious guise of “real science.”

So next time (God forbid), expect a more critical public reception of government edicts in response to a so-called pandemic. If there is one thing that COVID-19 taught humanity, it is that human leaders are fallible, perhaps even dishonest – especially when fear is rampant. In the future, the best cure for overreaction will likely include a rather large grain of salt.

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(Originally published with Liberty Nation News.)

MAHA leaders, many of whom gathered in front of the U.S. Supreme Court two days earlier to make their voices heard, felt vindicated. While their activism was around Monsanto v. Durnell (a ‘failure to warn’ case brought by John Durnell against Bayer/ Monsanto), the House victory was nothing short of a major win for them.

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But not everyone felt that way. Many people derided the bill as an upsetting compromise. Moreover, the bill still has to pass in the U.S. Senate, no small hurdle.

Part of the complexity of crafting any Farm Bill is the sheer magnitude of policy areas encompassed by the USDA, which oversees agriculture (impacting the nation’s farmers but also a myriad of industrial manufacturers); the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP); and the National School Lunch Programs (NSLP).

The budgetary impact here is profound, affecting hundreds of billions of dollars of annual public spending. The House bill was designed to be “revenue neutral,” resulting in all “stakeholders” scampering and battling for every scrap.

Fiscal policy converges in the Farm Bill with environmental lobbyists, farming organizations, industrial interests, and advocates for SNAP recipients. All of these policy areas intersect with the MAHA movement’s agenda.

The most salient issue of concern for MAHA was a win – the House voted in support of the (Rep. Anna Paulina) Luna amendment, which stripped pesticide liability immunity from the larger bill. Environmental groups and MAHA moms across the nation rejoiced that this pernicious, industry-favoring provision was chopped from the bill by strong bipartisan opposition.

Sadly, the battle for food and family safety is not over, as Monsanto and other chemical industry lobbyists petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to implement a de facto liability shield that would circumvent this legislative win by judicial fiat under federal preemption in the Monsanto v. Durnell case.

The Farm Bill process originated during the Great Depression as part of the New Deal to provide price supports to struggling U.S. farmers, and quickly expanded to include conservation practices, crop subsidies, and nutrition support for low-income Americans. It seemed bureaucratically sensible for USDA to be tasked with matching commodity surpluses with needy citizens, but the resulting system has become so gargantuan and complex that many critics have suggested bifurcating farming from food relief.

Until that happens, the Farm Bill will remain the unwieldy albatross for resolving numerous conflicting special interests and hundreds of provisions. The nation’s farmers, currently struggling with high input costs (especially fertilizers) and anemic commodity prices, are held hostage by these complexities. This tangled web explains why the Farm Bill is routinely kicked down the road, and why this one is at least three years overdue. It also explains why there are so many trade-offs in its creation.

The big win for pesticide liability included some other positives hailed by farming groups. The creation of a pilot program to expand local slaughter and processing services for small farms, a variation of the long-fought-for PRIME Act, is a positive for both consumers and farmers. And the House version expanded payments for livestock losses to predators, increased crop insurance availability, and included incentives for new farmers. It also bans foreign nations (i.e., China) from buying up U.S. farmland.

Not all farming is the same, and thus some provisions in the bill received conflicting responses. This is especially true of the incorporation of the so-called “Save the Bacon” provisions that elevate federal agricultural practices above state regulations that conflict, an indirect assault on California’s Proposition 12, which mandated improved housing and treatment for swine.

Small farmers opposed the Save the Bacon initiative, while large farms, especially in pork-producing states, hailed it as a way to prevent conflicting state-law patchworks that undermine profitability.

Most farmers would oppose the electronic ear tags for interstate transport of cows, yet Congress gave the nod to continue government tracking by a vote of 355-69.

And most consumers would oppose the decision to refuse states the ability to restrict access to soda by SNAP beneficiaries (though the current version allows for hot, whole chickens!) A majority of voters oppose sickening SNAP beneficiaries with soda: A majority of Congress still appears beholden to the influential beverage industry that lobbied hard to continue its federal support subsidies, which is sickening in itself.

Perhaps the most controversial provision of the current House version of the Farm Bill is its failure to restore full funding for SNAP. However, that battle is hardly over and will very likely resume in a contentious Senate battle to reshape the bill in an ongoing back-and-forth.

Typical of responses to the House version of the bill is this one from Judith McGeary, a food rights veteran, attorney, and founder and executive director of Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance (FARFA): “I was very relieved to see a strong, bipartisan vote to strip out the pesticide manufacturers’ liability shield, and of course, we have been strong supporters of the PRIME Act, and we’re pleased to see a pilot version of the program included,” said McGeary.

She continued, “Having said that, the bill as a whole still reinforces the current corporate-controlled, chemically-intensive structure for our agriculture, made worse by the inclusion of the so-called Save Our Bacon Act, removing local control over livestock production and undermining market opportunities for regenerative farms.”

In sum, the Farm Bill as currently hashed out by the House is a good step forward, but it has a long way yet to go. The MAHA movement has already made its mark by blocking a pesticide liability shield for manufacturers. More importantly, it is making a profound and enduring impact as millions of Americans scrutinize their food ingredient labels and the Farm Bill’s provisions like never before.

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(Originally published at The MAHA Report.)

(Photo by: Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

On April 29, the US Supreme Court ruled in Louisiana v. Callais that the state’s congressional voting districts constituted an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry promptly suspended congressional elections there, pending the creation of new districts. Redistricting without regard to race is expected to gain Republicans one to two House seats in a hotly contested midterm election season. On May 4, the Supreme Court granted a request that fueled rancor on the bench.

Issuing ‘Judgment Forthwith’

Under the rules, the certified judgment in Louisiana v. Callais would normally be issued 32 days following the release of the opinion unless the Court “shortens or extends the time.” On May 4, the Court indeed shortened it, issuing “judgment forthwith.” This essentially cleared the way for Louisiana to quickly redraw its districts, simultaneously undermining lawsuits seeking to preserve the pre-Callais voting districts.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson asserted that the majority’s decision to grant the application to issue the judgment forthwith served to interfere with the Louisiana election and expose the Court to accusations of political animus. Her dissent was sharp:

“To avoid the appearance of partiality here, we could, as per usual, opt to stay on the sidelines and take no position by applying our default procedures. But, today, the Court chooses the opposite. Not content to have decided the law, it now takes steps to influence its implementation. The Court’s decision to buck our usual practice under Rule 45.3 and issue the judgment forthwith is tantamount to an approval of Louisiana’s rush to pause the ongoing election in order to pass a new map.”

Sharp Judicial Swordplay

But Justice Samuel Alito’s concurring opinion dismissed such claims as “baseless and insulting,” emphasizing there was still time for Louisiana to change its map in time for the midterms. Otherwise, he wrote, “The dissent would require that the 2026 congressional elections in Louisiana be held under a map that has been held to be unconstitutional.”

But Justice Alito went further, rebuking Jackson while countering her claims of partiality:

“But the dissent does not explain why its insistence on unthinking compliance with Rule 45.3’s default rule does not create the appearance of partiality (by running out the clock) on behalf of those who may find it politically advantageous to have the election occur under the unconstitutional map. The dissent goes on to claim that our decision represents an unprincipled use of power … That is a groundless and utterly irresponsible charge … The dissent accuses the Court of ‘unshackl[ing]’ itself from ‘constraints’ … It is the dissent’s rhetoric that lacks restraint.”

Behind this juristic tension lies the modern American societal divide. It is not merely a possible pair of congressional seats in the balance, but as many as nine for the 2026 midterms and another 19 or more in 2028. Texas and Florida were redrawing their districts prior to the ruling. Alabama and Tennessee are doing so now. Callais is constitutionally seismic.

The Voting Rights Act has been used for decades to compel states and municipalities to employ race in drawing up voting districts. This has grown in impact, utilized by Democrats to craft favorable voting districts, and has become a sword of activist lawfare. Yet creating favorable circumstances for one racial group over another conflicts directly with the Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution.

Louisiana Reclaims Constitutional Primacy

According to constitutional law, the Constitution is the highest law of the land (the Supremacy Clause), and any laws that conflict – including federal statutes – are subordinate. The Voting Rights Act is not on equal footing with the Equal Protection Clause: The Callais court ruled that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act is limited to cases where there is strong evidence of intentional racial discrimination, and that race-conscious redistricting will be subjected to strict scrutiny in federal courts – the toughest of legal hurdles for review.

At core, then, the Callais decision has fully affirmed and held high the law of the land: that equality defeats equity; that government must ensure equality of opportunity, not of outcome; that cultural Marxism and racist critical race theory will not dominate America’s voting booths, tax structures, social programs, or public schools; and that Americans will be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin.

Louisiana’s new congressional voting districts represent the front wave of a political and cultural return to colorblind America. The very fact that Democrats face the prospect of losing so many congressional seats once color-focused districting is eliminated demonstrates just how much they have used race to gain power. Now that the dice are no longer racially loaded, Republicans have gained a huge benefit in this pivotal voting year.

Justice Jackson wanted the Supreme Court to delay official certification of its Callais decision so that Louisiana could be compelled to preserve an unconstitutional status quo through the midterms. The Court’s latest decision makes far more sense, allowing the state to address the problem before the election. Preserving the Equal Protection Clause and universal equality should remain every citizen’s duty.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)

(Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

The immigration battle between the Trump administration and activist judges will once again be brought before the nation’s highest court today (April 29). The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Trump v. Miot and Mullin v. Doe, consolidated cases challenging the administration’s efforts to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian and Syrian immigrants, respectively. Plaintiffs in both actions have secured stays in the lower courts against the government’s nonrenewal of TPS status. The Trump administration is asking SCOTUS to lift the stay, so that deportations of Haitians and Syrians in the United States under the program can be returned to their native lands.

TDS vs TPS

Attention to the Miot case intensified with the recent alleged murder by hammer of a mother of two by a Haitian immigrant in Florida. The suspected offender, Rolbert Joachin, originally entered the country illegally but was then granted TPS by the Biden administration, which subsequently expired in 2024. Other high-profile criminal offenses have been alleged in recent years against Haitian immigrants in Massachusetts, including Cory Alvarez, charged with the aggravated rape of a 15-year-old girl; Akim Marc Desire, accused of indecent assault and battery on a child under age 14; Wisteguens Jean Quely Charles, an alleged member of a violent Haitian street gang, who had 17 prior criminal convictions, including for drugs, weapons (firearms and brass knuckles), and assault and battery; and Gasnoy Saintilme, arrested on multiple charges, including drug trafficking and illegal firearms possession.

Despite these alleged egregious offenses and potential threats to public safety purported by the Trump administration, judges appear to have been contorting clear laws to thwart efforts to deport Haitian and other immigrants who availed themselves of the TPS program, replacing agency determinations with their own. Repeatedly, these courts have ruled that the loss of jobs, housing, and family connections by TPS immigrants justifies staying their deportations pending legal challenges, essentially using judicial fiat to reverse the clear rule of law and regulatory authority governing immigration programs.

The government counters that these courts have invoked outrageous claims of racist animus by President Donald Trump as a motivating factor in ending TPS protections and second-guessed Department of Homeland Security decision-making, putting American citizens and national security in jeopardy in the process. Prior Supreme Court decisions in similar legal disputes have resulted in the overruling of these sketchy stays, and a similar outcome is anticipated in the Miot and Doe disputes.

Haitian Immigration History

Congress created the TPS scheme to permit the temporary immigration of individuals affected by war, violence, or natural disasters. Haitian immigration under TPS expanded dramatically following the devastating earthquake there in 2010, increasing even more during the Biden administration. It is now estimated that some 350,000 Haitians currently reside in the United States under the program, adding to a swollen roster of other immigrants admitted into America under what was supposed to be a safe-haven program that morphed into a long-term, large-scale pipeline of even more immigrants, often insufficiently vetted for criminal proclivities.

The Haitian earthquake is long over, prompting former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem to issue a timely determination that the relevant TPS designation should be terminated. (Syria’s TPS designation is also longstanding, having been granted in 2012.) Lower courts found that there were potential harms to the plaintiffs from being sent home, including loss of jobs, leases, and family connections. Yet the government asserts that, by statute, courts lack jurisdiction to oversee DHS determinations of TPS designation, and all harms alleged were inherent in the temporary nature of the TPS program created by Congress. That is, by definition, immigrants would suffer harm by the termination of the TPS designation, but this does not grant standing to sue under a statute that was already magnanimous.

In its application for a stay in the Miot case, the government essentially argues that the lower courts reversed the standard required by the enabling TPS statutes, placing immigrants’ inconveniences above urgent government responsibilities, stating:

“The majority viewed respondents’ harms, ‘including risk of detention and deportation, separation from family members, and loss of work authorization,’ as outweighing any harm to the government in maintaining the status quo … a view that would preclude the government from showing irreparable harm any time it alters existing policy.”

The Trump administration also points rather persuasively to the specific language of the TPS statutory framework, which provides in 8 U.S.C. 1254a(b)(5)(A) that there will be “no judicial review of any determination of the [Secretary] with respect to the designation, or termination of a designation” of a foreign state for TPS. But the judges in question concocted a bizarre end-run around that plain language. As explained by the application for stay: “The court then portrayed Section 1254a(b)(5)(A) as ‘[n]arrow’ and limited to challenges to ‘the Secretary’s determination’ — not challenges to ‘how the Secretary went about making her determination.’”

A Long-Fought Legal Dispute

The roots of this judicial insurrection did not arise under an Obama or Biden administration, but Donald Trump’s first term. This upending of legal precedent and tradition began in the 2018 case of Ramos v. Nielsen, in which a district court enjoined the DHS termination of the TPS designation for Haitians because the “‘extraordinary and temporary conditions’ relating to the 2010 earthquake that prevented Haitian nationals from returning in safety” were “no longer met.”

The first Trump administration fought this decision, but the case dragged along in court until the 2020 advent of the Biden administration, rendering the case moot – the appeal of Ramos was never heard. Yet the current justifications for the obstruction of DHS TPS determinations repeat almost verbatim what the court in Ramos v. Nielsen ruled in 2018. The Ramos court found that the plaintiffs had established that DHS had “changed the criteria applied by the prior administrations,” that this “may have been done in order to implement and justify a pre-ordained result desired by the White House,” and that the underlying motives were racist.

The Ramos court held:

“Plaintiffs have also raised serious questions whether the actions taken by the Acting Secretary or Secretary [were] influenced by the White House and based on animus against non-white, non-European immigrants in violation of Equal Protection guaranteed by the Constitution. The issues are at least serious enough to preserve the status quo.”

The government countered then – and again now – that the “status quo” includes the continued presence of insufficiently vetted foreign immigrants on American soil, an ongoing public safety risk to US citizens that also undermines national security. The courts have argued that granting stays against government deportation would not inflict irreparable harm, yet the Trump administration (and regular news headlines) vociferously counter that claim.

Polls show a majority of Americans support the deportation of violent criminals and also suggest even legal immigration is suffering as Americans reassess past views in light of the open borders and daily crime reports they have engendered. It may be that judicial cartwheels such as Ramos and its recent progeny have fostered will sow similar distrust of federal courts and the government’s capacity to simply enforce clear laws.

The Supreme Court is likely to agree with DHS and the Trump administration in these cases, not because of some nebulous “conservative bias” but because this Court applies the law. If immigration advocates wish to change statutes they don’t like, they must do so through Congress, not partisan judicial hijinks.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)

Few substances have fueled controversy the way glyphosate, a weed killer and pre-harvest desiccant, has. The MAHA movement has targeted the chemical as hazardous, but the chemical industry and Big Ag dismiss health claims as unfounded, citing decades of regulatory approval. Yet, as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been explaining for years, regulatory capture by lobbyists and special interests has compromised scientific inquiry. As more studies of the subject accumulate, the evidence continues to prove that glyphosate is harmful, especially to children. This also proves Secretary Kennedy correct – U.S. regulators have looked the other way from “real science.”

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In March, 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the specialized cancer research agency of the World Health Organization (WHO), issued a determination by 17 experts that glyphosate is a “probable human carcinogen.” However, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has persistently found the chemical to be safe and effective, even increasing acceptable exposure levels in food. Since 2015, more studies of glyphosate have been conducted, and not just examining carcinogenicity.

At the same time, more than 181,000 plaintiffs have filed lawsuits against glyphosate manufacturer Bayer, which owns Monsanto, claiming their non-Hodgkin lymphoma was caused by glyphosate and the company’s failure to properly warn of its dangers. Many juries have agreed.

Industrial critics of MAHA supporters’ claims that glyphosate causes cancer often poo-poo the IARC as a source, pointing out (correctly) that MAHA is hardly a fan of the WHO, especially regarding vaccine recommendations. IARC also claims sunlight is carcinogenic (in large doses, which is common knowledge and affirmed by the American Cancer Society), and that red meat is cancer-causing. The IARC actually found that it is the cooking of red meat that creates carcinogens, and that “red meat contains proteins of high biological value, and important micronutrients such as B vitamins, iron (both free iron and haem iron), and zinc.”

Glyphosate does not contain high biological value: Quite the opposite. Those raising alarms about glyphosate no longer need to point to the IARC for authority. A growing body of scientific study is accumulating like logs behind a bursting dam, recently reviewed by 50 scientists and academics at a March 25-26 conference called the Seattle Glyphosate Symposium.

The symposium focused on studies conducted after IARC’s 2015 determination and addressed health threats beyond cancer. At the conclusion of the two-day assessment, a statement (the “Seattle Statement”) was adopted that recounted the many potential deleterious impacts of glyphosate on humans, condemned the use of biased, industry-commissioned research by regulatory agencies to skew safety determinations, and called for more rigorous, unbiased “real science” to resolve this decades-long controversy conclusively.

It’s not looking good for glyphosate, or for the humans who ingest it (biomonitoring surveys have detected glyphosate in samples collected from 70-80% of all people examined).

Glyphosate is the most widely used pesticide in the world, and its use as a pre-harvest desiccant just days before harvest of food crops leads to relatively high levels of residues accumulating in many foods.

The U.S. EPA has long stood by the Monsanto/Bayer narrative that glyphosate is harmless, despite successful court challenges and the recent retraction of a long-used study (ghost-written by Monsanto) that argued the substance is safe.

As the U.S. Supreme Court weighs whether to grant Bayer and other chemical manufacturers legal immunity from personal injury claims so long as they comply with federal labeling requirements based on EPA safety determinations, public scrutiny has soared to unprecedented levels.

The Seattle Statement warns, in part: “There is additional evidence from human and/or animal studies that glyphosate and GBHs increase the risk of multiple adverse health effects in addition to cancer, including diseases of the kidney and liver, and impacts to the reproductive, endocrine, neurological, and other metabolic systems. Children, infants and fetuses are the most susceptible.”

The statement continues, “Further strong evidence finds that glyphosate and GBHs cause genetic damage, oxidative stress, and hormonal disruption — biological changes that can set disease in motion….. The evidence that glyphosate and GBHs harm human health at levels of current use is now so strong that no additional delays in regulation of glyphosate can be justified.”

This laundry list of potential (probable) harms to human health connects glyphosate to the chronic disease epidemic and the food Americans eat. It is not just farmers who are exposed: glyphosate is ubiquitous.

As more science emerges demonstrating the central importance to health of the human gut microbiome (and the brain-gut connection), the role of an ingested weed killer like glyphosate is obvious. Glyphosate works by interrupting the shikimate pathway in plants. Humans don’t rely on the shimitake pathway – but many beneficial bacteria in their guts do. Moreover, some harmful bacteria appear to develop resistance to glyphosate, allowing them to thrive in a condition known as dysbiosis. Research has shown that bees also suffer from glyphosate-induced microbiome damage, weakening their immune systems. One recent study linked glyphosate and gut microbe imbalance with anxiety.

One needn’t earn a master’s degree or PhD (as most of the signatories to the Seattle Statement possess) to understand this threat. Earthworms and other important soil critters, as well as the vital soil microbes that feed plants, are also at risk. The risk of glyphosate extends far beyond cancer, and far beyond humans – much of the current research has studied livestock and other animals.

Dr. Robert Malone has chronicled dozens of studies that show the dire impact of glyphosate on fetal development, fertility, and the human reproductive system. High amounts of glyphosate have been detected in 30% of tested baby foods and 90% of tested breakfast cereals. Glyphosate is particularly prevalent in oats, wheat, soy, and lentils.

Following the Seattle Symposium, Bayer issued a statement defending its product, reportedly stating that it “stands behind the safety of our glyphosate-based products which have been tested extensively, approved by regulators and used around the globe for more than 50 years… [N]o health regulator anywhere in the world has ever found glyphosate to pose a threat to human health.”

In view of the voluminous evidence of threats to microbes, bees, earthworms, and humans, this statement is more incriminating than exculpatory. Bayer is unwittingly confirming RFK Jr.’s warning that regulators ignore or dismiss the “real science” of health risks (much like with vaccine injuries). It is also calling 181,000 sick plaintiffs liars.

Thanks to the MAHA movement and research such as that reviewed at the Seattle conference, the cultural noose is closing on glyphosate’s neck. The political and regulatory nooses will follow, regardless of what the U.S. Supreme Court rules in Durnell. Health-conscious Americans no longer need to cite the dated IARC study now that they have a decade’s worth of subsequent incriminating scientific evidence that glyphosate causes human harm. In another decade, the evidence will be even more abundant, and the free market will extinguish glyphosate if the EPA has not.

If the regulatory agencies charged with protecting Americans fail to acknowledge the known risks of glyphosate, and the SCOTUS uses labeling laws designed to protect consumers to instead shield chemical companies, then the job of protecting the future health of children will depend on We the People.

Related Reading:

Is Congress Shielding Chemical Corporations From Accountability? - Liberty Nation News

Why Kennedy Is Right About Glyphosate - by John Klar

Legal Immunity for Pesticide Manufacturers? - American Thinker

Justices to hear dispute over cancer warnings on pesticide labels | SCOTUSblog

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(Originally published in The MAHA Report.)

In many ways, my nonfiction book reads at times more like a dystopian novel, reflecting just how dire and precarious the modern human connection to trustworthy food supplies has become. Yes, Americans are struggling against a chronic disease epidemic driven in large part by harmful food additives and the absence of real nutrition in much of what they eat. But as I document in The Coming Food Crisis, the control of food supplies has been accompanied by the collapse of local rural farm economies in many regions, the transportation of food over ever-longer distances, and growing dependency on fragile supply lines that have created unprecedented risks not just to food safety but food security — whether people can get any food at all.

The ample food supplies on US grocery shelves create an appearance of plenty that could evaporate (or escalate dramatically in price) very quickly. This was witnessed during the Covid-19 pandemic, when shelves were stripped of precious toilet paper: imagine if instead of expensive eggs or processed foods, there was no food at all, or eggs cost $100/dozen.

There are numerous threats that could trigger such a crisis, the most certain of which is price inflation caused by unscrupulous or undisciplined management of the nation’s money supply. Printing money (fiat currency) to fund pet projects or basic needs is an ever-present temptation: I document several cases of this throughout history and show how it will likely one day impact US inflation due to the runaway national deficit. A pick-up truck that costs $100,000 today represents not an increase in truck value so much as a decline in the value of a US buck. Hyperinflation is defined as inflation exceeding 50% per month. If you think that can’t happen to the beloved US dollar, you have avoided the study of both history and economics.

I am a farmer who understands the challenges of raising, processing, storing, and distributing foods. I am a student of economic history, combined with my background studying tax and finance. I’m also a student of the globalist effort to dominate all food production in the world under the alarmist flag that only industrial consolidation and dependence on chemicals like glyphosate and synthetic fertilizers can “save the world”…. from carbon dioxide and cow farts.

We all laugh at the attacks on cow farts, yet still the Gateses, Gores, and Schwabs tell us we must eliminate cows from our diets. I explain the truth behind these lies and expose the age-old motives of profit and power that lurk behind them. This is what is spurring the widespread farmer revolts across Europe, which I also survey in the book, including interviews with farmers there. Imagine a currency collapse, followed by a “rescuing” electronic currency linked to a social credit score. Corporations and government (and NGOs) will then completely dominate human access to food. You will “own nothing,” and eat what you’re told.

Please support my work while increasing awareness of these and other threats that are increasing at an alarming rate. Buy my book (or listen to the audio version, in my voice) to inform and empower. I explain in the book the policies and practices that will help us all reverse this industrial food supply consolidation and reclaim our food sovereignty, along with better health outcomes for our children and grandchildren.

I am inexpressibly grateful to all of my readers (and paid subscribers) here on Substack, and to those who read my books. I write to inform, to effect change. I speak up for cows as well as humans! People must become more aware of the environmental, economic, and totalitarian threats that are growing daily because of food industry malfeasance….

And if you have read my book, please go to Amazon and post a supportive review. This feeds the algorithms and encourages more readers to discover why there is a Coming Food Crisis in America.

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Kentucky’s legislature and state supreme court are facing off in an epic battle over the parameters of their respective authority. This separation-of-powers turf war centers on a legislative effort to impeach a sitting judge. The Kentucky Supreme Court has ruled that only the judiciary has this power in the absence of serious impropriety. In response, the legislature voted overwhelmingly on its last day of session to censure a supreme court judge for his opinion in the case. The gloves are off.

Hatfields and McCoys?

Observers claim this eyebrow-raising warfare has long simmered between Kentucky’s Republican-dominated legislature and the state’s highest court. The current iteration stems from the legislature’s use of its constitutional power to impeach public servants to initiate proceedings to remove a judge, not for criminal acts but for bad decisions. At a time when activist judges create public outrage by going too soft on violent criminals (or, as in a recent case in Minnesota, aiding an illegal immigrant to escape out the side door of the courthouse), similar efforts may arise in other states.

Fayette Circuit Judge Julie Muth Goodman rendered six decisions the legislature cited as grounds for removal, including dismissing a murder indictment, reversing a jury verdict of conviction, imposing probation instead of a five-year sentence, and releasing a convict from prison 21 years early. All of these decisions were reversed on appeal, but the Kentucky legislature listed them as grounds for impeachment.

Judge Goodman is not accused of accepting a bribe, engaging in illicit sexual conduct, or driving drunk. In a 5-1 decision, the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled that the legislature lacked the constitutional authority to impeach her. In his concurring opinion, Justice Kelly Thompson wrote:

“Officials cannot be impeached for a traffic ticket. They cannot be impeached based on a political disagreement or an unpopular decision. They cannot be impeached because they have blue eyes. They can only be impeached for criminal conduct that occurs during their term of office.

“As a matter of constitutional interpretation, Judge Goodman’s conduct as alleged cannot qualify as a ‘misdemeanor in office.’ The allegations against her, even if fully believed, do not establish that she has engaged in a criminal act in office. The legislature would strip us of our power to interpret the Kentucky Constitution and require us to blindly defer to its political judgment.”

Indignation Escalation

But Judge Goodman didn’t stop there, asserting that lawyers (in the legislature) who refused to acknowledge the authority of the state’s highest court to adjudicate the interpretation of the Kentucky constitution could be referred for disbarment and possible criminal accountability. This certainly upped the ante between the warring branches, prompting the passage of a censure motion by a whopping vote of 77-15 in the Kentucky House. House Resolution 140 defiantly states, in part: “This honorable body affirms that the impeachment powers of the General Assembly remain inviolate and declares that those powers cannot be limited, circumscribed, or otherwise violated by the Kentucky Supreme Court or anyone else….”

The Senate Impeachment Committee suspended (but did not terminate) impeachment proceedings against Judge Goodman pending review by the Judicial Conduct Commission. This was only a partial tip of the hat to the Kentucky Supremes, as if to say, “If you don’t take care of Goodman, we will!” Such high-stakes hijinks would be alarming in any state.

Just hours before the House resolution, the Kentucky Senate passed a censure resolution against Judge Thompson sponsored by Senate President Robert Stivers. In prompt retort, Judge Thompson shot back:

“I have great respect for President Stivers and am honored I got under his skin.

“The beauty of our democracy is the will of the people in an election is sacrosanct. To remove an elected official is very serious business. That’s what I said. It takes a grave offense to impeach. I wrote an opinion that says he can’t impeach for an opinion and he retaliates against me for my opinion.”

Kentucky Internecine Warfare

These barbs reflect a deep-seated rivalry that both sides claim threatens the balance of powers of the Kentucky government. Caleb O. Brown of the Bluegrass Institute told Liberty Nation News: “The Kentucky Supreme Court has declared war on the separation of powers in Kentucky.” The legislature has risen forcefully to the challenge, staunchly defending its impeachment turf, backed by the dissenting decision of Judge Christopher Shea Nickell, who stated that “in establishing the judicial power, Section 109 [of the Kentucky Constitution] maintains that ‘[t]he impeachment powers of the General Assembly shall remain inviolate.’ ”

Each side demands that it possesses the power to interpret the law. Judge Thompson expressed in his concurrence that he sees a growing pattern, perhaps reflecting the broader landscape behind the bitter recriminations surrounding Judge Goodman’s impeachment:

“We cannot allow the legislature to arbitrarily threaten impeachment based on its dislike of any of our rulings…. The question we must ask is: Why is the legislature suddenly using its impeachment power to target judges, not for criminal conduct but for their rulings?

“Throughout the history of Kentucky, less than a dozen officers have been impeached. This sparse number of impeachments has suddenly changed. Five impeachment petitions were filed in 2026. Pursuing impeachment proceedings against judges based on disagreeing with their legal decisions is a perversion of the impeachment power and a power-grab that threatens the judicial branch and its independence through intimidation.”

Kentuckians will have to wait and see, popcorn in hand, how this power squabble pans out. The legal dispute is unique to Kentucky law, but the scramble for legislative and judicial autonomy (and the power to impeach) may arise in other states (or the federal government) as well. If so, Americans will do well to recall the (currently ironic) Kentucky state motto: “United We Stand, Divided We Fall.”

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(Originally published in Liberty Nation News.)

Fake Milk — (Photo by Al Drago/Getty Images)

Mississippi has outlawed lab-grown dairy products, including fake milk. The passage of legislation blocking corporate efforts to displace dairy farmers and their cows with gleaming vats and factories marks not only the impact of the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement but also consumer pushback against corporate domination of food supplies for profit. Fake milk has been created for profit and control, based on fake science that is easily debunked by anyone who knows about cows.

Got Fake Milk?

Globalists and multinational corporations have pushed fake milk as a trifecta of wins for consumers. Proponents argue it is healthier, will combat climate change, and reduce animal suffering. Mississippi’s high-profile rejection of this propaganda signals that people are waking up to the fact that the industry behind fake foods seems geared toward profit at the expense of the environment, farmers, animal welfare, and human health. As Mississippi Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson proclaimed, “We want real food for the real people of Mississippi.”

The state’s bipartisan House Bill 1153 flat-out banned the manufacture or sale of fake dairy products and restricted meat labeling on “alternative protein products” such as plant-based substitutes.

Americans have been lied to about food health for decades. Margarine was touted as healthier than butter, but it was just more profitable to simulate the real stuff with hydrogenated fats made from vegetable oils. Eggs were replaced with fake substitutes, and now we know chickens produce a superfood. Red meat was condemned based on studies of highly processed meats containing a phalanx of preservatives. And remember how women were told it would be “more convenient” to replace their mother’s milk with corporate formulas tainted with chemicals?

A Corporate Scam Revealed

Fake milk can be added to the list of corporate scams backed by regulators and NGOs. Early on, artificial milk was described as “an animal-free dairy product … made in a lab using genetically engineered yeast programmed with DNA to produce the same proteins found in cow’s milk.” Now the linguistic plug describes it as “precision fermentation that produces biomass cultured from cells.”

Perhaps fake milk should be called mRNA milk, to clarify that it is grown from yeast (in GMO-plant-based solutions containing pesticide residues) and then mixed with minerals, sugars, fats, and flavorings. Put that on the packaging and see how it sells.

The giveaway is that not one of the three “justifications” is true. The “animal welfare” argument ignores that, as cows are replaced with factory fabrications, they do not retire to green pastures but to abattoirs. Will cows eventually only be seen in a zoo? The “climate change” argument is baseless – cows sequester more carbon dioxide and methane in soil with their manure than they emit; that manure is replaced with synthetic fertilizers, especially urea, which is made from natural gas (aka methane). Manure builds soils; chemicals deplete them. And the “human health” argument goes out the window quickly. While many people are lactose intolerant, faux milk is not as healthful as the real deal and is just another chemical-laced processed replacement for farmers and their bovine charges.

How does building factories filled with gleaming vats and rubber tubes help the ecosystem? How does transforming GMO-cropped plants dependent on glyphosate and pesticides into fake food improve the environment, let alone human health? Let cows eat God’s solar panels (aka grass), rebuild soils, and feed hungry humans.

Farmers, Humans, and Cows (Oh My!)

As more people are beguiled into drinking cow milk substitutes, the price paid to farmers for their milk has plummeted in the United States to less than $19 per hundredweight – below the cost of production. Dairy farmers are struggling to maintain intergenerational farms and keep their animals from slaughter. The huge corporations that push them out of business and off the land gain an irreversible domination of human dining and health when they replace cows with factories and monopolize milk production.

Mississippi is leading America and the world toward truth and common sense. The globalists deceive humanity into complacent submission to absolute control. If people want to drink facsimile factory potions that put cows and farmers out of work and bolster corporate dominance, they should be free to do so – just like some people like to smoke cigarettes despite clear health risks. But labels should warn consumers rather than trick them into believing they are drinking the real thing. Mississippi has gone the whole hog to simply ban the stuff.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)

(Photo by Kathryn Gamble for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Five plaintiffs who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits have sued the US Department of Agriculture, alleging it violated the law by allowing states to restrict access to sugary drinks, candy, and other products deemed unhealthy. The complaint alleges that the Trump administration lacked authority to restrict beneficiaries’ free choice.

Lawsuit for the Poor, or the Beverage Industry?

The case was brought by the National Center for Law and Economic Justice (NCLEJ), which advocates for low-income people, and Shinder Cantor Lerner, an antitrust law firm. Katherine Deabler-Meadows, a senior attorney for the NCLEJ, reportedly stated in an interview that granting waivers to the states served as a “backdoor in national policy that expresses the administration’s preferences around food.” The suit alleges the USDA did not permit sufficient public comment under the Administrative Procedures Act and that it violated the Food and Nutrition Act because the waivers do not “increase the efficiency” of SNAP or “improve the delivery” of benefits. The plaintiffs also argue that the USDA “authorized states to narrow the statutory definition of ‘food’ haphazardly without statutory authority or evaluation methodology, and without notice to or input from the people or businesses directly affected.”

The businesses directly affected include beverage manufacturers, a powerful lobbying group that has long been criticized for elevating profits above consumer health.

“Millions of Americans rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to help feed their families. They deserve the same freedom to choose the foods and beverages that best fit their needs,” the American Beverage Association said in a press release. “Restricting products – like soda – from SNAP won’t make anyone healthier or save a $1 in taxpayer spending, whether SNAP costs today or healthcare costs tomorrow…”

“The fact is beverages are not driving obesity and chronic disease in America,” the statement concluded.

MAHA vs SNAP

In the midst of the Make America Healthy Again movement led by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., such claims do not resonate very powerfully. The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health reports:

“Americans consume on average more than 200 calories each day from sugary drinks (58,59)—four times what they consumed in 1965 (60)—and strong evidence indicates that our rising thirst for ‘liquid candy’ has been a major contributor to the obesity and diabetes epidemics.

One of the states named in the suit is West Virginia, a leader in MAHA initiatives. West Virginia also holds the unsavory honor of being the most obese state in the nation. SNAP waiver advocates claim that beneficiaries do not lose the dollar value of benefits and can still buy lobster and caviar with them. The stated goal is to improve health, and recipients can still buy soda with their own funds. Public opinion parallels this perspective, with many Americans expressing resentment that they have to subsidize junk food rather than healthier, whole-food options.

Past Efforts Have Failed

A 2016 USDA study found that the top item purchased in SNAP households was soft drinks, accounting for 5.4% of all expenditures, whereas non-SNAP households spent only 4% of their food purchases on soft drinks. Efforts to restrict unhealthy offerings to benefit, not discriminate against, low-income Americans have persisted for years. The beverage lobby has earnestly fought for the free choice of recipients to buy what they want.

In 2024, the Center on Opportunity and Social Mobility lamented that the House Agriculture Committee failed to pass an appropriations bill authorizing a pilot program to evaluate whether dietary restrictions in SNAP would improve health outcomes for low-income households. The organization claims its research supports such restrictions, stating:

“A large and growing body of research shows that SNAP contributes to poor health. Although low-income households disproportionately experience health issues such as diet-related disease and obesity, our own research shows that SNAP recipients fare worse than other low-income households on these outcomes.”

SNAP beneficiaries cannot purchase unhealthy options such as tobacco and alcohol. Perhaps the DC district court will be asked to decide whether soda is or is not healthy for recipients, and thus within the USDA’s authority to restrict on that basis. More likely, the case will be decided on whether the agency complied with procedural requirements and possibly sent back for a public comment period and other administrative safeguards.

However, given the current MAHA climate, overwhelming evidence that soft drinks lack nutritional value, and strong public sentiments against taxpayer subsidization of unhealthy beverages, the majority of comments will likely support USDA’s decision to allow states the latitude to administer the program to improve health outcomes instead of soda industry profits.

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(Originally published at Liberty Nation News.)