For the better part of the last century or more there has been something of an unspoken compact between the sphere of politics and the sphere of sports; they have basically stayed out of one another’s way.

This compact—already deteriorating—has been shattered as President Donald Trump went head to head with players in the NBA and NFL about questions of patriotism.

Regrettably, we should expect this story to expand over time because this does represent, I would argue, a major turning point in the culture. When you have sports and politics now colliding in such an explosive way it’s going to be very difficult to disentangle them.

This story provides further evidence of a very lamentable development in American culture, and that is the intrusion of politics into virtually everything, into every arena of life.

That’s not healthy, it’s not healthy for any society. It is certainly not healthy for the United States of America in 2017.

Wherever we go from here it is previously uncharted territory for the presidency, patriotism, and professional sports.

The rise of childlessness is reaching increasingly alarming levels in Europe.

The Economist recently noted that “just 9 percent of English and Welsh women born in 1946 had no children. But, for the cohort born in 1970, the proportion is 17 percent. But now in Germany, 22 percent of women reach their early 40s without children; in the German city of Hamburg 32 percent do.”

The fact is, no society can survive without an adequate number of children being born, and that there is a very real prospect, as we already see in a nation like Japan, the childlessness leads to an eventual demographic and economic disaster.

The Economist, however, defends childlessness saying, “The childless are thus a small but useful counterweight to the world’s parents, who perpetuate social immobility by passing on their social and economic advantages to their children.”

Let me just point out that the only way to resolve that passing on of what’s identified here as social immobility is for the society to come to an absolute end through childlessness. That’s the embrace of nihilism.

Let’s face it for what it is.

The New York Times recently noted the death of a prominent feminist, Kate Millett, who died at 82. The obituary rightly points out that Millett’s book “Sexual Politics” became known as the Bible of Feminism in the ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s.

In her book, published in 1969, included her words, “Patriarchy’s chief institution is the family. It is both a mirror of and a connection with the larger society; a patriarchal unit within a patriarchal whole.”

What she called for was an overthrow of patriarchy, which would involve the complete overthrow the family and marriage and the normativity of heterosexual relationships, and the expectation of having children.

In the end, Kate Millett died a very sad life. The passing of Kate Millett reminds us of how these kinds of ideas and come into our culture and of the toxic effects that they often have. But very sadly, it also reminds us that any worldview that sees the having and raising of children as a problem and as a burden rather than as a blessing cannot but end in sadness.

Since the Trump Administration announced the end of President Obama’s DACA policy, the nation now turns to Congress to determine what should be done about the “dreamers,” those 800,000 young people brought illegally to the U.S. as children who are now hoping for a future in America.

It is vital that we make an important distinction made often in our American courts: namely, the distinction between what is constitutional and what is right.

Justice Antonin Scalia is famous for saying that a policy can be stupid but not unconstitutional. Similarly, a policy may achieve a righteous end, but the means of doing so may be unconstitutional. Such is the case with DACA.
There has to be a way of getting to what the DACA policy was attempting to do, but that does not circumvent Congress, and it’s now Congress’ responsibility.

President Trump has given Congress six months to act legislatively and decisively to guarantee the same kind of security to DACA recipients. Now is the time for Congress to act.

A public radio station in Berkeley, California, KPFA, recently dis-invited world-renowned scientist Richard Dawkins due to his alleged “abusive speech” about Islam.

Over the years, Richard Dawkins has basically insulted the intelligence of anyone and everyone who believes in God. He has made extremely caustic comments about Christianity and every other theistic worldview, including Islam.

Dawkins says the station’s accusation that he has engaged in abusive speech about Islam is libel. Moreover, he points out, “I am known as a frequent critic of Christianity and have never been de-platformed for that. Why do you give Islam a free pass? Why is it fine to criticize Christianity but not Islam?”

Now that’s a really good question. Why is Richard Dawkins not de-platformed for criticizing Christianity, but rather for Islam? It is because of the very twisted understanding of sensibilities, the redefinition of speech, and the protection of certain groups rather than others.

The story also sadly tells us how a radio station that’s supposed to serve the public in encouraging and allowing conversation, instead can and will simply shut it down.