Daily News Roundup

Estimated Reading Time: 16 minutes

NOTABLE QUOTES

Ginger Morrow columnist for the Washington Free Beacon: More than a million voters across 43 states have left the Democratic Party and registered as Republicans in the last year, according to an analysis of voting data by the Associated Press. Of the 1.7 million voters who have changed parties in the last year, around two-thirds registered Republican, AP found. The voting data showed the phenomenon is almost universal throughout the country.

Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis (D-Calif.): “Who is Clarence Thomas? Is he my Saudi Arabian father who’s going to tell me what I can and cannot do with my body, with my life?” “Be prepared to live in defiance of these six people who think that they have the right to tell you what you can do with their [sic] bodies.”

Brianna Lyman reporter for The Daily Caller shares a warning from U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas: Thomas said while Americans’ disinterest in the Constitution isn’t an issue for the Supreme Court, it is an issue for Americans themselves. “It’s a burden on them, the citizens,” Thomas reportedly said. “They’re going to lose their liberties.” Thomas added while the court does its best to protect liberties, it is just “one part of the effort.”

Brian A. Smith, author of The Statesman as Thinker: If we are to see great statesmen again, it will require a generational effort—one that must take place largely in civil society and the home.

Matthew Boose contributor to American Greatness:Since children are not, in fact, autonomous beings, once separated from the family they naturally will gravitate to some other authority for guidance and protection: the state. With the “trans youth” craze, a predatory state sees a new frontier in its generations-long effort to expand itself by smashing family bonds and grafting the broken human beings left behind to itself. The greater the number of confused, isolated, dysfunctional people who will depend on the state for support and “gender-affirming care,” the better for the state.

Matthew Boose contributor to American Greatness:While the Left denounces the term “groomer” as a reactionary slander, it’s hard to deny at this point that the sexual “liberation” of children is the “Pride” movement’s new focus.

TUESDAY PRIMARY RESULTS

Trump wins big in Illinois primary, New York GOP picks Zeldin over Giuliani

Voters in five states chose nominees Tuesday for the fall election, with former president Donald Trump scoring big in Illinois where state Sen. Darren Bailey won the Republican gubernatorial primary and Rep. Mary Miller defeated fellow Republican congressman Rodney Davis. Miller and Davis were forced to compete against each other in the state’s redrawn 15th Congressional District. Miller is seeking a second term. Davis, the more moderate of the two candidates, had served in Congress since 2013. Trump campaigned for Miller and Bailey, a family farmer, this past weekend in the candidates’ home state. In perhaps the other most-closely-watched race, the Colorado GOP primary for secretary of state, . . . […] In New York, GOP Rep. Lee Zeldin . . .[…] Also in Oklahoma, . . .

JANUARY 6 COMMITTEE

Mallin: DOJ seizes phone of former Trump attorney John Eastman as part of election probe, says lawsuit

Authorities on Wednesday seized the cell phone of John Eastman, the former attorney for Donald Trump at the center of the House committee’s investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, as part of the Justice Department’s criminal probe into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, according to a lawsuit filed by Eastman’s attorney. In the lawsuit, Eastman’s attorney claims that the agents served the warrant on him last Wednesday evening while he was exiting a restaurant. They claim Eastman was frisked and his iPhone was seized, and that the agents made him provide biometric data to unlock his phone.

The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in New Mexico, seeks to have the phone returned to Eastman.

Kelly: January 6 Committee Ignores Key Questions About FBI

The final set of witnesses testifying before the January 6 select committee had the potential to shed more light on the government’s foreknowledge of the protest on Capitol Hill that day. Jeffrey Rosen, appointed by Donald Trump on Christmas Eve in 2020 to replace departing Attorney General William Barr, and two of his deputies gave opening statements and fielded questions for more than two hours last week. None of it had anything to do with the events of January 6, 2021. […] Speaking of January 6 characters tied to the FBI, the committee has not addressed an issue of great interest to most Americans and some congressional Republicans: the involvement of FBI informants or undercover agents in the Capitol protest. Attorney General Merrick Garland last year refused to tell Rep. Tom Massie (R-Ky.) how many federal assets participated in the Capitol protest, if any encouraged others to enter the building, and whether any agents did. “I’m not gonna violate this norm of, uh, of, of, uh the rule of law and I’m not gonna comment on an investigation that’s ongoing,” Garland said. Republican senators have also received the silent treatment from the FBI. […] The presence of federal infiltrators is not speculation.

THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

Johnson: THE MISSING STATESMANSHIP

Chief Justice Roberts is a practitioner judicial statesmanship that is occasionally difficult for an outsider to understand. Most famously, Roberts switched his vote on the constitutionality of Obamacare in the face of President Obama’s intimidation. It was a sorry performance that invited more of the same from those for whom it’s all politics. In Dobbs, Roberts’s statesmanship resulted in an eccentric concurring opinion that none of his colleagues on either side of the case found persuasive. University of St. Thomas Distinguished University Chair & Professor of Law Michael Paulsen puts it this way in a Public Discourse column declaring the magnificence of the Court’s opinion by Justice Alito (I have split one long paragraph in two): Chief Justice Roberts concurred in the judgment only, making six votes to uphold Mississippi’s ban on abortion after fifteen weeks. But the rest of his opinion is bizarre. Obsessed with a desire to rule . . . […] It seems to me that the statesmanship that is called to protect the Court as an institution is the kind that would let the Democrats know . . .

Benson: Flashback: Did Justice Sotomayor ‘Lie’ to Senators About Gun Rights?

One of the hottest lefty talking points in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling is to allege that various conservative justices “lied” during their confirmation processes. Some of the more excitable types are calling for impeachments or court-packing, which the White House still opposes, and has no chance of happening in the current Senate. Setting aside the more hysterical consequences being demanded in some quarters, the underlying allegation is unfounded. At National Review, Dan McLaughlin patiently explains why: . . . […] One question that comes to mind is whether the hordes clamoring for removals, or other radical outcomes, over right-leaning justices’ supposed ‘lies’ about Roe would rage with the same indignation if one of their fellow leftists had done something similar. We can, in fact, definitively answer that question, non-hypothetically — and we don’t have to reach back into ancient constitutional history, nor do we need to cite an example on an issue that lacks a similar cultural potency: . . .

THE SECOND AMENDMENT: A LIBERAL VOICE

(Nov. 27, 2021) Bret Weinstein: Liberal Case for Gun Ownership

Liberty needs defending from the threat of tyranny. At the beginning of the pandemic, I was out hunting for supplies, running through scenarios and planning for contingencies. I found myself at a local gun shop, where a line of edgy patrons stretched out the door and down the block. It’s not the kind of place my high school self would have imagined my middle-aged self would frequent. I am, after all, an American liberal, and American liberals, as a rule, believe that our founders (fresh from a war they won with muzzle-loaded weapons) left us in a terrible mess with respect to modern guns. Decades ago I changed my position on the issue of “gun control”. Even though I still believe liberals are correct about the unfortunate predicament created by our founders, I now hold that we must tolerate privately held guns and all that comes with them. That may sound like a paradox, but once you understand the tensions internal to the mind of an armed American liberal, you will understand something fundamental about the American experiment. Portland, where I live, is an absurdly progressive city on the compulsively liberal Pacific coast. But that isn’t the whole story. Washington, Oregon, and California, the three left-coast states, vote as a Democratic block. But that’s not because we lack for conservatives. We have lots of them. They are just consistently outnumbered and outvoted. I should probably explain here that, although I believe that liberals are right about the unacceptable cost of our second amendment rights, conservatives are closer to correct, as I see it, about the governing of our cities — a fact that becomes glaringly obvious if you visit Los Angeles, Seattle or San Francisco and compare it to any major city in conservative Texas. American liberals don’t seem to understand that their values cannot simply be implemented locally. That’s partly why I’m armed like a conservative despite my liberal values. But I digress. That day at the gun shop, most of the people I stood in line with were conservatives who felt like they could use a bit more firepower. And I couldn’t fault them. So did I, apparently. I imagine they sized me up and read me as a liberal. I’m pretty sure I look like one. But I felt welcome, or at least as welcome as one can in an environment where there is a run on guns and ammo.

Watch the 12:50 minute video: https://www.reddit.com/r/BretWeinstein/comments/v8866o/tyrants_are_driven_into_retreat_by_armed_citizenry/

GOP

Klingenstein: The Appeal of Ron DeSantis

Recently, I received a fundraising email from Governor Ron DeSantis that was different from the others. Although the DeSantis email is written in the (cringeworthy) patois of its genre, it does, within the limitations of such an email, provide an unusually comprehensive, integrated view of our current circumstances. DeSantis sees the pieces and fits them into a reasonably coherent whole. Many people know the country is in trouble, though they can’t quite say why. DeSantis explains it, as a statesman should. DeSantis begins: Our country is currently facing a great threat. A new enemy has emerged from the shadows that seeks to destroy and intimidate their way to a transformed state, and country, that you and I would hardly recognize. The quality of the prose aside, the point is clear: . . .

THE DEMOCRAT LED WAR ON CHILDREN

Prager U: The Sexualization of Children

Who should decide when and how to discuss issues like sex and gender with young children? Just a decade ago, this was thought to be the sole purview of parents. But that is no longer the case. Why is this shift happening, and who’s behind it? Karol Markowicz addresses these important questions.

Watch the 5 minute video: https://www.prageru.com/video/the-sexualization-of-children

Boose: The Groomer ‘Panic’ Is a Hill Worth Dying On

While the Left denounces the term “groomer” as a reactionary slander, it’s hard to deny at this point that the sexual “liberation” of children is the “Pride” movement’s new focus. What other conclusion can we draw from the recent “Drag Your Kids to Pride” event in Dallas, where children handed dollar bills to men dancing sexually in front of a neon sign that read, “It’s not going to lick itself?” Progressives have defended this obscenity, calling the backlash overblown. It’s a pattern we have seen a lot lately. The Left blew a gasket when Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed an unobjectionable bill, incongruously labeled by them the “Don’t Say Gay” law, that simply bans teachers from talking about sex to kindergarteners. Who could have imagined 10, even five years ago, that the country would be caught up in a “debate” about whether it is proper to sexualize 5-year-olds? Well, some did imagine it but they were mocked and dismissed as alarmists and bigots. Now, just seven years after gay marriage became the law of the land, they have been vindicated.

FAUCI/BIDEN INEFFECTIVE & DANGEROUS COVID VACCINES

Housman: CDC Caught Using False Data To Recommend Kids’ COVID Vaccine

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showcased highly misleading data about the risk of COVID-19 to kids when its expert vaccine advisers voted to recommend vaccines for children under five years old. The agency featured a pre-print study ranking causes of death in children when it presented data to its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) earlier this month, after which the committee voted to recommend kids aged six months through four years get vaccinated for COVID-19. The study claimed to show that COVID-19 was a leading cause of death for children in the United States during the coronavirus pandemic, but observers quickly pointed out major flaws in the data which rendered it misleading. […] The CDC did not respond to multiple requests for comment when asked why it presented this misleading data and how that study made it though the agency’s rigorous review process.

[…] The Daily Caller reached out to all 11 authors listed as contributors to the research. Only one responded, Dr. Deepti Gurdasani, an epidemiologist and senior lecturer in machine learning at Queen’s University of London. Deepti wouldn’t comment on the effect of publishing fundamentally flawed research affecting the healthcare of children other than to take a pot shot at Fox host and Daily Caller co-founder Tucker Carlson.

Fleetwood: Why Aren’t More Republicans Highlighting The Risks Of Giving Infants Covid Shots?

In greenlighting the use of Covid jabs for infants, the CDC and FDA also officially made the United States the first country in the world to do so. U.S. President Joe Biden took to Twitter to celebrate the decision, saying that “For the first time in our fight against this pandemic, nearly every American can now have access to life-saving vaccines.” Similar sentiments were also echoed by White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, who repeatedly emphasized how America would be “the first country on earth to give mRNA vaccines to its youngest children.” […] In light of such minimal risk to children and that the jabs don’t stop individuals from getting or spreading the virus, medical professionals have begun to raise concerns about the U.S. government’s push to vaccinate infants against Covid, given the risk of harmful side effects balanced against the potential benefits.[…] DeSantis Courageously Says the Truth Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis a recent press conference also highlighted the medical concerns about giving healthy babies Covid shots. “We are not gonna have any [state] programs where we’re trying to jab 6-month-old babies with mRNA. That’s just the reality,” he said, while referencing several data points on the subject. “The White House is bragging that we’re the only country that is trying to do mRNA shots for infants … There’s nothing wrong with being the lone ranger if you’re right, but the other countries in Europe that are going a different direction, similar to the direction Florida’s gone, they have been right on Covid way more than [Dr. Anthony] Fauci and his crew have been throughout this whole thing.”

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING THE U.S. MILITARY

Mann: West Point graduates sign letter challenging leadership of military academy

“We wanted to challenge the leadership of the Academy and the Defense Dept on their WOKE actions, CRT, Diversity training and the other discrepancies in the Academy,” retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely, told the Epoch Times. “We found it pervasive at the Naval and Air Force Academies so we knew it was directed from the highest levels of our Military Leadership. We all want the Military to get back on track to training and leading our Armed Forces to secure America and it’s Citizens,” he said. The letter, titled, “Declaration of Betrayal of West Point And the Long Gray Line,” requests from the academy information in a number of areas including a justification for the mandatory COVID-19 vaccination of cadets and an explanation for reaching so-called “Critical Race Theory” at West Point.

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING FOREIGN POLICY

Spencer: Biden’s Handlers Allow Members of a Foreign Terrorist Organization to Enter the U.S.

Fifty people on the terror watch list have been apprehended at the Southern border so far this year, and there is no telling how many got across without being caught. And now Old Joe Biden’s handlers have opened up a new way for terrorists to get into the United States: Iran International English reported late Friday that “the Biden admin has decided to lift a controversial ban on the entry into US of Iranian men who’d been conscripted into IRGC, a Foreign Terrorist Organization, as part of their compulsory military service, as they don’t ‘pose a national security or public safety risk.’” The IRGC is Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which the Trump administration designated a terrorist organization in 2019. In their avidity to roll back every last thing that Trump did, Biden’s handlers are once again actively endangering Americans. This decision to allow certain IRGC members into the country is a compromise move designed to get the Iran nuclear deal negotiations moving again.

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING AMERICA

War Room: Todd Bensman – Federal Judge Reverses Biden’s No Deportation Policy, Deportation Free Zone

Todd Bensman talks to host Steve Bannon about the ruling by a federal judge in Texas that overturned a Biden administration policy that prevented deporting virtually all illegal aliens including criminals. The judge said that the administration was not following the law. Under Obama, there were 4.5 million deportations during his eight years. Under Biden, there were 50,000 deportations in the first year, which is a rate less than one-tenth of what happened under Obama!

Watch the 8:18 minute interview: https://warroom.org/2022/06/27/todd-bensman-federal-judge-reverses-bidens-no-deportation-policy-deportation-free-zone/

Binder: Biden Greenlights Colorado Giving Health Insurance to Illegal Aliens

Late last week, Biden’s Health and Human Services (HHS) and Treasury Department approved an application by Colorado officials to provide subsidized health insurance to illegal aliens in the state. The subsidized health insurance will be provided via the Colorado Option plan, as described in the state’s application to Biden’s agencies:. . .[…] Colorado officials are hoping to enroll about 10,000 illegal aliens under the subsidized health insurance program in the first year, with more enrollees every year after. In the first year of the subsidy program, the state can enroll up to about 10,000 unauthorized Coloradans, representing only a portion of the state’s unauthorized and uninsured Hispanics. […] Today, nearly 300,000 illegal aliens reside in Colorado.

Devine: The Democrats’ lies on abortion since SCOTUS’ overruling of Roe v. Wade

Abortion enthusiasts have been telling so many lies since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last week, it’s hard to take them seriously. Now President Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are salivating at the prospect that “abortion is on the ballot,” as opposed to inflation, crime, border security and all the issues that have the Democrats under water and without a viable policy. But abortion may not be the electoral game-changer they hope for, and largely that’s because the lies they tell themselves and their supporters have caused them to lose touch with the reality of America. Lie 1: Biden and Pelosi are ‘devout Catholics’ “Women caring for their health” is the president’s euphemism for abortion. It was a “sad day” and “a tragic error,” said Biden, when the Supreme Court returned the issue to the voters and their elected state representatives to decide. He vowed to “do everything in my power” to preserve abortion.

Downs: Biden’s Nominee to Lead ICE Withdraws from Consideration

On Monday night, Ed Gonzalez signaled that he was withdrawing himself from consideration as President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). […] Gonzalez’s tweets indicated he announced his decision to the president on Sunday, and that he had made the decision “after prayerfully considering what’s best for our nation, my family, and the people of Harris County who elected me to serve a second term as Sheriff.”

THE BIG GUY’S SON

Pearce: ‘What’s Wrong With You?’: Hunter Biden Lashes Out After Lavish Spending On Russia-Connected Escorts Revealed, Report Says

Hunter Biden spent more than $30,000 on escorts, many of those payments made to entities with Russian email addresses, from November 2018 and March 2019, according to documentation reviewed by The Washington Examiner. The report said that Biden’s escorts were partly funded by his father, President Joe Biden, who sent Hunter $100,000 across multiple installments in December 2018 and January 2019. The Washington Examiner did not uncover any evidence that Joe knew about his son’s purchases of escort services, while some messages suggest that Hunter misled his father as to what he was spending the money on. After the Examiner published the results of part of its investigation into records and messages contained on Hunter’s laptop, abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop in 2019, Hunter reportedly emailed a Washington Examiner reporter: “What’s wrong with you?” Hunter did not respond to a request for comment from The Washington Examiner before the article was published Monday. Neither did Hunter’s attorneys nor the White House.

Greenfield: Trump’s Pee Tape Wasn’t Real, but Biden Was Financing Hunter’s Russian Hookers

Rule #1 is that the Left always accuses you of the things that they’re doing. What the Russiagate smears reveal is what the smearers were doing. We already know a whole lot about the Clintons and we keep finding out exciting things about the beneficiary of the Mueller investigation. President Joe Biden apparently unwittingly financed his son’s participation in an escort ring tied to Russia, records from a copy of Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop show. […] This is Joe Biden actively funding criminal activity possibly involving foreign players linked to an enemy state. Yes, the story suggests he didn’t know. We have no idea what he knew or didn’t, but it’s hard to believe that he knew nothing about Hunter’s lifestyle at that point. And no Republican would get that kind of benefit of the doubt.

THE DEMOCRAT PARTY’S MARXIST PLAYBOOK: WAR ON THE FAMILY

Patterson: Strong Families Are Worth Defending

In 1965, Daniel Patrick Moynihan wrote a landmark report in which he contended that the rising number of black families headed by unmarried mothers would reduce the prospects for Blacks to rise out of poverty, in spite of that era’s landmark civil rights legislation. Moynihan was furiously denounced for his efforts. But he was proven right and he would be even more correct making the same observations today. It’s been a tough half-century for families. Although Moynihan focused his concerns on Blacks, family breakdown correlates as much with income level as it does with race. Because there are more low-income Blacks, more black children are raised by single mothers, but the overall percentage of births to unmarried women has gone from 5% in 1960 to 40% today. In 1970, 84% of US children spent their entire childhood with both biological parents. Today, about half do. Partly because of the withering criticisms directed at Moynihan, the chattering classes have mostly avoided the issue of family deterioration, at least until recently. But the consequences have been enormous.

THE CORRUPT & DANGEROUS DEMOCRAT PARTY’S MEDIA INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX

Vespa: LA Times Op-Ed: I Don’t Know About All These Blacks Owning Guns

Well, this was an inevitable piece from the Left’s meltdown over the Supreme Court’s ruling on the Second Amendment. […] It was the worst week ever for liberals as they had to deal with this ruling and the overturning of Roe w. Wade the next day in the Dobbs case. So, how does the Left deal with an expansion of civil rights? They worry about gun ownership spiking among nonwhites. Yeah, they’re going all ‘rifle clubs a la Reconstruction’ on gun rights when it comes to black Americans, and we’re supposedly the side taking America backward. That’s what hit the op-ed pages of the LA Times:

[…] Column: Is California ready for more Black people to legally carry guns in public?

BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

The Federalist Staff: How Democrats Made Themselves Miserable And Want You To Be Too

Editor’s note: The following is an adapted excerpt from “Liberal Misery: How the Hateful Left Sucks Joy Out of Everything and Everyone,” by Federalist D.C. Columnist Eddie Scarry, available now on Amazon. It made some sense that liberal Democrats would be bitter immediately after the 2016 election. The country had just denied Hillary Clinton—yes, Empress Hillary Clinton—as heir to her throne and instead chose to elevate a foul-mouthed barbarian named Donald Trump to the presidency. A true outsider who represented all the things liberals hate— masculinity, optimism, independence—ruined the illusion that America was now exclusively their domain, a place they had hoped to use for their racial fixations, “green energy” projects, and weird gender-bender social experiments. They lost. And losing hurts. But it’s not supposed to be permanent. The next critical election is always within arm’s reach and there are more productive ways to spend time than holding on to the pain of the last one. As of 2016, though, liberals and Democrats no longer saw things that way, if they ever truly did at all. After that election, they believed there was no reason to pretend that they understood differences of political opinion, nor that they could tolerate them. They no longer viewed Republicans, conservatives, or even just open-minded independents as the opposition in an honest democracy. They saw them all as an existential enemy . . .

HISTORY 101

Federer: The Ten Commandments & the need for a Moral, Educated Population in a Self-Governing Republic

John Adams wrote to Thomas Jefferson, November 4, 1816: “THE TEN COMMANDMENTS and the Sermon on the Mount contain my religion.” President Harry S Truman addressed the Attorney General’s Conference, February 1950: “The fundamental basis of this nation’s laws was given to Moses on the Mount … I don’t think we emphasize that enough these days… If we don’t have a proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a totalitarian government which does not believe in rights for anybody except for the State.” […] At the time of the Exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt, sometime around 1,400 BC: the Hittite language had around 375 cuneiform characters; the Indus Valley Harappan language had around 417 symbols; the Luwian Anatolian language of had over 500 logographic hieroglyphs the Akkadian language of Mesopotamia had over 1,500 Sumerian cuneiform characters; the Egyptian language had over 3,000 hieroglyphic characters; the Chinese language had nearly 10,000 pictogram and ideogram characters, invented by scribes of China’s Yellow Emperor. In most other countries, only the upper class could read: kings, pharaohs, emperors, their scribes, the ruling class and merchants.

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, he not only had THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, but he had them in an easy-to-learn 22 character alphabet. […] President Eisenhower stated February 20, 1955: “The Founding Fathers … recognizing God as the author of individual rights, declared that the purpose of Government is to secure those rights … In many lands the State claims to be the author of human rights … If the State gives rights, it can – and inevitably will – take away those rights.”

EDUCATION

Randall: K-12 Students Deserve to Inherit an American Birthright

America needs new social studies standards, to teach our children America’s history and ideals. If education reformers don’t act now, Woke social studies standards will teach a slanderous caricature of our history that prepares students to work to replace our republic with an illiberal regime. That’s why the Civics Alliance, a coalition of organizations and individuals dedicated to improving America’s civics education, has created American Birthright: The Civics Alliance’s Model K-12 Social Studies Standards. American Birthright has been released the week before July 4, to honor Independence Day. State standards are the most influential documents in America’s education system. State education departments use them to provide guidance to each public K-12 school district and charter school as they create their own courses. State standards also influence what textbook authors write and what assessment companies such as the College Board test for in their advanced placement examinations. They affect teacher training and they provide the framework for teachers’ individual lesson plans. Private schools and homeschool parents also keep an eye on state standards. The Civics Alliance wants to improve every aspect of American social studies instruction by inspiring America’s state education departments to provide social studies standards that teach American students their birthright of liberty.