Can Americans be financially coerced to underwrite labor unions when they are opposed to positions taken by unions?

That was the big issue this week before the nation’s highest court—whether workers can be coerced to financially underwrite and undergird labor unions when the positions taken by the union would be opposed to their own convictions.

The case is known as Janus v. AFSCME—the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees—and it challenges Supreme Court precedent that goes back four decades, requiring persons in certain categories of employment to contribute union dues and fees even when they do not want to be members of the union.

Today, with Justice Neil Gorsuch on the court, it is expected that the court will reverse its 40-year-plus precedent.

This may mean a big, big change on America’s political landscape.

Townhall Review — February 24, 2018

Dr. Albert Mohler,  President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary,  remembers America’s Pastor, Billy Graham, who went on to be with his Lord this past Wednesday. Larry Elder and Constitutional law professor John Eastman address the latest indictments of 13 Russian nationals for election interference in 2016. Hugh Hewitt comments on Sr. Fellow at the Hudson Institute Lee Smith’s article in The Federalist on the disappearing media coverage of the growing Russian collusion scandal. Dennis Prager speaks with economist and gun rights advocate, John Lott, about the gun control debate surrounding the  Parkland, Florida massacre. Mike Gallagher invites Paul McQuillen onto the show seeking to have a civil discourse on politicians seeking political gain using gun violence studies as a foundation. Frank Luntz, a conservative pollster and political adviser, sits in with Michael Medved to discuss his observations of his recent “60 Minutes” interview and an Oprah Winfrey led focus group.  Michael Medved returns to call out his Alma Mater, Yale University, for some academic foolishness.

On the issue of pornography, the New York Times has just given us an example of what moral surrender looks like.

The cover story of the magazine is titled, “What Teenagers Are Learning From Online Porn.”

The main argument is that pornography has become the main vehicle for sex education amongst American teenagers. Access appears to be such a given in terms of the adolescent experience in our nation today that the New York Times Magazine article is mostly important because of its central message: This is simply a reality you’re going to have to find a way to deal with it.

In one amazing paragraph, the author—Maggie Jones—actually suggests that the moral issue is not whether or not teenagers are looking at pornography, but what kind of pornography they are viewing and whether or not it brings out a certain form of sexism in them.

It’s as if—as a society—we’re really past the ability to render moral judgment.

It’s another dark milestone in the moral context of our culture.

Congress is currently considering the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act of 1965. And we should all sit up and take note.

Sometimes legislation that looks almost innocuous is anything but; sometimes legislation that will have historic and long-lasting effect doesn’t go by any name that would get the citizens’ attention; and sometimes it’s almost as if politically it’s moving under the surface without much attention at all.

This reauthorization is an entire clash of worldviews in one piece of legislation. It’s to the credit of the Trump administration that the over-500-page bill is loaded with respect and concern for the future of religious liberty in the United States, and, most specifically, the future of religious liberty on American college and university campuses.

Now, all of this might look routine, but the result can turn out to be anything but routine.

It’s no exaggeration to say that the future of religious liberty will have a great deal to do with the final state of this bill.

On January 29, we witnessed a very historic vote on the floor of the United States Senate.

The vote was for the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, a bill that would’ve banned abortion after the unborn child had reached 20 weeks of gestation. It failed by a vote of 51-46—reaching a majority but falling short the required 60 votes to move the bill to the floor for a full up or down vote.

But what we saw was courageous—and it was convictional. It was necessary. Remember that it took 15 years in order for the United States Senate to pass what became known as the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act—15 years of bringing bills to a vote again and again and again until finally a sufficient number of senators voted for that bill protecting babies from partial-birth abortion.

And senators are going to have to bring the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act back. We have to hope that they will—again and again and again—until we reach the 60 votes necessary to make this act the law of the land.

The president recently made an historic appearance by satellite transmission to the March for Life, becoming the first president of the United States to do so.

President Trump, just a matter of years ago, had described himself as very pro-choice, but now he can only be described in terms of his actions and statements as very pro-life.

I cannot dream of understanding exactly how he came from a pro-choice position to a pro-life position, but I do know this: he put himself very much on the line in that webcast of the March for Life. He has also put himself and his administration on the line for the pro-life position in numerous executive orders and in developments even just the day before.

Whatever happened in the thinking and in the heart and in the policies of Donald Trump over the last several years is exactly what needs to happen amongst millions and millions of our fellow Americans.

That’s what we strive for, that’s what we hope for, that’s what we pray for, and that’s what we work for.

The moral confusion of our culture was appallingly illustrated in a recent article in the New York Times: “Is your child lying to you? That’s good.”

The author, Alex Stone, refers to research suggesting that the children who learn how to lie the earliest are the children who turn out to be smarter. It takes a certain amount of intelligence, after all, to learn how to lie.

Your child isn’t lying? Well, don’t worry. The article supplies exercises you can do with your child to speed up the process of learning how to lie.

Stone goes on to suggest that one of the worst things parents can do is to punish a lie. Instead, he encourages parents to pay children to tell the truth.

We really are living in a world turned upside down when parents in a major American newspaper are told to celebrate when their toddlers lie and are offered tactical advice about how to teach them to lie.

It’s a catastrophe. It’s a moral world turned upside down. And that’s no lie.