Widening Revolt Against Globalism

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The shocking knife attack last week on children in broad daylight in Dublin was horrifying. Five people, including a five-year-old girl, two other youngsters, and a woman, were randomly stabbed and slashed by an assailant outside the primary school named Gaelscoil Coláiste Mhuire.

For years open-border liberals have been allowing extensive immigration into Dublin, similar to what has transformed London. When news leaked that the perpetrator was an immigrant, all-night rioting in Dublin ensued.

But then the Irish prime minister lashed out against the rioters, rather than the unprovoked attacker. Nearly a week later, Irish authorities shamefully continue to withhold his identity.

The prime minister’s response was to promise new laws immediately against “incitement to hatred and hatred in general.” Though not Irish, Elon Musk dryly observed, “Ironically, the Irish PM hates the Irish people.”

An unidentified young Irishman nailed this issue with an interview that aired on Musk’s X platform. The new legislation “has been drafted specifically to silence the Irish people from opposing ... the mass immigration agenda that’s going on right now. ... Migrants or so-called refugees are being dumped en masse on small Irish towns,” he said.

He called the mass immigration imposed on Ireland by globalists a “new plantation.” That term strikes a nerve among Irish who have long used it to bitterly criticize the colonization of Ireland by English Protestants in the 1600s.

Ireland joined the European Union, which means globalist politicians running Ireland have agreed to allow entry by any citizen of any other European Union nation. Some quip that any nationality other than British is accepted in Ireland today.

But hoi polloi are revolting against globalism now. Geert Wilders of the Netherlands won a stunning victory by campaigning against globalism and vowing to hold a public referendum there to exit the EU, which he calls “Nexit,” as Great Britain did with its Brexit.

Wilders’ political party won far more seats than expected, surging above poll predictions, and has left the powers-that-be in Europe in shock. This is similar to election returns in Spain, Italy, Greece, Turkey and Finland, as globalists have been repeatedly routed by Trump-like candidates vowing to put their own country first.

Add Argentina to that growing list as the campaign theme of Make Argentina Great Again propelled Javier Milei to a landslide victory and Trump declared, “I am very proud of you.” Though smeared as “far-right” by CNN, Milei won with 56% of the vote last week as a pro-life libertarian who recognizes global warming as a “lie of socialism.”

Even many Canadians are finally fed up with globalism. The largest Ukrainian population outside of Russia is in Canada, where nearly 5% of its population, or 1.4 million people, is Ukrainian.

Last week the Conservative Party of Canada unanimously voted against a new trade agreement with Ukraine, in a humiliation of Canada’s far left prime minister Justin Trudeau who had signed the deal in expectation of full support. Instead of explaining why he thinks globalism is good for Canada, he lashed out at Donald Trump.

“The real story is the rise of a right-wing American, MAGA influence thinking that has made Canadian Conservatives, who used to be among the strongest defenders of Ukraine … turn their backs on something Ukraine needs in its hour of need,” Trudeau blustered. But no one is buying that spin any more.

In the U.S. Senate, where the much-criticized uniparty of pro-globalism senators control the agenda, a vote on sending many billions more to Ukraine is expected soon. New Speaker Mike Johnson and other conservatives in the House deserve credit for not including this in their recent continuing resolution to fund our government.

This leaves Democrats in a quandary as the presidential election heats up. Biden is closely associated in voters’ minds with an open southern border that has let in 10 million illegal aliens during his presidency.

Democrats are suddenly hinting that they might agree to modest measures to close our open southern border. But that’s just pre-election talk by Biden’s team as they see the handwriting on the wall for voters to turn against him for allowing so many illegals into our country.

Any tightening of our southern border in 2024 will just be reopened again if Biden or any Democrat were to win the next presidential election. It is not enough for Democrats to talk about closing a bit of the southern border, but instead need to take action to undo the massive amount of damage they have already caused by their open-border policies.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott just endorsed Trump for president, belatedly, as Trump visited the rampage by illegals over the Texas-Mexico border. Trump now has strong allies in Argentina, Italy, Greece, Hungary, and elsewhere as his admirers have swept to victory.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

Lack of Discipline in Schools is the Problem

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Students are not showing up in public school today, as attendance is no longer desired by parents. Many public schools have become places of indoctrination by the Left, or downright dangerous to attend.

No one can continue to blame this on Covid-19, when schools shut down. Absenteeism is severe long after the pandemic subsided, as in Nevada where more than a third of the students are chronically absent.

Only 42% of American adults are reportedly satisfied with schools, a 20-year low. Disillusionment with costly higher education is increasing and that may have a spillover effect on attitudes toward secondary education too.

This disappearance of students in classrooms is not merely a few teenagers skipping out for some fun, which is not new. Elementary students who need to be learning fundamental skills during that period of their life are not being taken to school.

Just five years ago only 7% of elementary public schools had chronic absenteeism by 30% of students. But in 2021-22, the percentage of the elementary public schools having chronic absenteeism shot up to 38%.

Last month the New York Times reported that the schools run by the Department of Defense for about 66,000 children of service members have been doing better than public schools in all 50 states, as measured by the widely followed National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) exam. Most of these schools are on American military bases.

The Department of Defense Education Activity schools were first in our nation on the NAEP reading and math assessments in 2022. These schools were the only state or jurisdiction to show an increase in performance in any grade or subject that year.

The U.S. Army has a larger minority population than America as a whole: 46% compared with 40%. The outperformance by secondary schools on military bases compared with other public schools is due to better discipline.

A total of 45% of students in these Department of Defense secondary schools are in low-income families, which is higher than the national average of 38%. Moreover, one-third of the children in military families move each year due to transfers of their parents, which is a hardship.

The military knows how to discipline its members, without permitting bad behavior until expulsion becomes necessary. Corporal punishment, such as swatting a misbehaving student, was allowed nationwide by the U.S. Supreme Court for public schools in Ingraham v. Wright (1977), yet states outside the South ban it.

In public schools 77% of teachers are female today, in sharp contrast with how our military is run. The overwhelming percentage of those public school teachers are liberal and opposed to any physical punishment of any kind for bad conduct.

Studies show that physical penalties for misbehavior are not any more harmful than other forms of punishment, such as repeated yelling. Many of the same students who are violent toward other students and teachers also play in violent sports like football, which create a far greater risk of injury to them than any physical discipline would.

Bringing back sensible discipline to public schools is way overdue, and would be a better focus of the never-ending special sessions in Texas where Gov. Greg Abbott just called for a record-breaking fourth legislative session on education. Even if vouchers for private schools were to pass there, the vast majority of students would remain in declining, undisciplined public schools.

A third of teachers encounter threats by students annually, yet effective punishment is not allowed. Instead, liberals are permissive about misconduct until violence occurs, and even then sometimes fail to impose appropriate penalties.

While forbidding any meaningful discipline, public schools ultimately expel students but only after an egregious rampage. The single biggest reason for the increase in homeschooling is a fear by parents for the safety of their children in public schools.

Yet rather than restore order in schools, the failed approach of Vice President Kamala Harris while she was the district attorney for San Francisco was to prosecute parents for truancy, the outdated criminalizing of non-attendance at school. When she campaigned for California attorney general she promoted enacting a state law to punish parents when their children missed more than 10% of public school.

“We are putting parents on notice. If you fail to take responsibility for your kids, we are going to make sure that you face the full force and consequences of the law,” Harris threatened parents.

Harris, Biden, and the entire Democrat Party pander to teachers unions who should be blamed for turning schools into dens of crime, drugs, and liberal ideology. A study by the libertarian Cato Institute during Covid showed that delaying the reopening of schools was not based on valid concerns about the virus and safety, but on how powerful the regional teachers unions were.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

GOP Should Reject Improper Ballot Initiatives

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The “will of the people,” as expressed by outcomes of heavily funded ballot initiatives, is a canard that should be rejected by Republicans. Direct democracy was feared and opposed by our nation’s founders, who established a representative government for the United States and guaranteed “a republican form of government” to each of its member states.

Yet Republican candidates who participated in last week’s third presidential debate seemed to misunderstand this crucial point, as reflected by their senseless responses to questions about a recent ballot initiative that just passed in Ohio. Ron DeSantis, for example, unjustifiably blamed the pro-life movement for being “caught flat-footed” by Issue 1, the abortion initiative, without mentioning that God-given rights should not be decided by a popular vote.

Republicans should be defending representative government against misuse of the ballot initiative process, which allows out-of-state industries and liberal billionaires to pass laws contrary to the informed decision-making by each state’s elected representatives. Ohio’s Issue 1 will benefit the billion-dollar abortion industry, while Issue 2 will profit the expanding marijuana industry by invading Ohio with a predicted $4 billion worth of pot.

Fortunately, some members of the Ohio state legislature are rising up against this misuse of ballot initiatives to change the culture of the Buckeye State. Ohio’s elected representatives should not take a back seat or bow down to ballot initiatives contrary to what has been the well-established tradition of Ohio and our Constitution.

The passage of the radical Issues 1 and 2 in Ohio are an assault by out-of-state industries and billionaires to transform the state, and its Republican-controlled General Assembly should strongly resist this invasion. Four out of five Republicans voted against Issues 1 and 2, and that is to whom the Republican legislators should be listening, rather than a multi-million-dollar barrage of television ads.

Legislators should not be deterred by chants in the media that “the people have spoken.” Representatives exist to resist tyranny by a misled majority, and Republican officials should not abandon the pledges they campaigned on for the benefit of Ohio.

Caving in to ballot initiatives is a betrayal of representative government, and of voters themselves. By denying the rights of voters to elect representatives to protect their state’s way of life, Republicans give residents an incentive to move to Texas and other states that prohibit mob rule through ballot initiatives.

Leftists are giddy about their scheme to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to use the ballot initiative process in about 20 states (40% of our country) to enact laws rejected by legislatures there. Not content with transforming Colorado and the West Coast into havens hostile to families, liberals are exploiting this process to invade the Midwest with failed coastal values.

More Midwesterners will inevitably respond by moving to Texas, where Leftists are not allowed to override the legislature. But families in Ohio and Missouri should not have to move to protect their way of life.

In less than a year, marijuana as enacted by ballot initiative in Missouri has transformed it into a $1.5 billion mecca for pot, with pervasive billboard advertising and retail stores selling it. Child poisonings and motorcycle accidents are sharply higher, while a crisis in fentanyl-related deaths has increased too.

The Republican response to questions about Ohio Issues 1 or 2 should be that some issues are not suitable for popular vote, as most states recognize by forbidding ballot initiatives from bypassing the legislature. We don’t allow any type of initiative or referendum at the national level because our Founders who framed our Constitution wisely rejected direct democracy.

Yet the liberal media is misusing ballot initiatives to bully Republican legislators into breaking their own campaign promises on which they were elected. There is no such thing as a particular “will” of the people, and candidates should honor their campaign pledges rather than allow out-of-state billionaires to rewrite their laws in a harmful way.

Republicans reject the call for a National Popular Vote to pick our president, and instead that office is filled by the Electoral College. Republican candidates for president should campaign on defending our republican form of government against the progressive strategy of direct democracy.

Our Declaration of Independence stands entirely against infringement on God-given rights by popular vote or by any other means. That timeless document describes the concept of unalienable rights as a “self-evident” truth, yet Trump’s rivals for president seem to think everything is fair game for ballot initiatives.

The Ohio legislature, with its Republican supermajority, could immediately overturn the cannabis Issue 2 ballot initiative to prevent Ohio from becoming a decadent culture of pungent weed. The marijuana-saturated states of California and Colorado are hemorrhaging in population, and Midwest legislators should not allow liberal mistakes to transform the middle of our country based on improper ballot initiatives.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

Dems Despair as Trump Surges

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Liberals and their favorite media have given up on Biden as he plummets in the polls ahead of next year’s election. On Sunday the New York Times announced that Trump leads Biden in 5 of the 6 swing states, sending a signal to all liberals that Biden must be replaced as the Democrats’ nominee for president.

The filing deadline for the New Hampshire primary has already passed, and Democrat insiders have little time left before their South Carolina primary on February 3 to coalesce behind a replacement. Meanwhile, “the world is falling apart under Biden,” as 53-year-old Spencer Weiss, a Pennsylvania voter who has switched his support from Biden to Trump, told the NYT.

Biden has mishandled foreign crises from Ukraine to Israel, while letting in 10 million unemployed illegal aliens, more than the entire population of overcrowded Los Angeles County. He turns 81 years old later this month and plainly lacks the mental acuity to still be president.

Biden and his supporters have pushed transgender access to girls’ restrooms and locker rooms in schools, which sparked a walkout by students in Loudoun County, Virginia last week. In April, Biden proposed a federal rule under Title IX that would prohibit schools from categorically banning transgender students from invading girls’ sports.

Trump has led in stopping illegal immigration, which could include foreign terrorists hateful of the United States. He has also been strong against allowing male-bodied athletes to invade girls’ sports.

Michelle Obama and California Gov. Gavin Newsom are mentioned as possible last-minute replacements of Biden. Other potential candidates powerful with the insiders include Senate Majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and the same-sex married Pete Buttigieg, the Transportation Secretary who has bungled the electric car issue.

Democrat political insiders have compared their dilemma to a “five-alarm fire,” but Biden and his determined wife Jill refuse to step aside. Many Democrats who disapprove of funding foreign wars instead of domestic priorities are jumping ship: Biden’s advantage over Trump has eroded among black voters from a 78-point advantage to only 49 points.

A new poll was released by ABC News/Ipsos on Sunday, announcing that 76% of American adults feel our country is headed in the wrong direction, while only 23% see us going in the right direction. On the key issues of crime, inflation, and immigration, voters trust Republicans more than Democrats.

We are only a year from the presidential election, and barely ten months before early voting begins in some states. Worsening foreign crises and deepening economic problems, combined with an inevitable further decline in his mental capacity, mean there is no plausible way for Biden to reverse his slide.

Biden failed to file paperwork to be on the ballot in New Hampshire, while an obscure Minnesota congressman did file there, reminiscent of how Minnesota Sen. Eugene McCarthy chased the Democrat incumbent President Lyndon B. Johnson from the race in 1968. Biden is counting on support by black primary voters in South Carolina to renominate him, but a deal between Obama and an alternative could force Biden to withdraw.

Much of the angst by Democrats over Biden is due to how well Trump is surviving the onslaught of politically motivated prosecutions. None of federal prosecutor Jack Smith’s attacks on Trump has worked, while many of them have backfired.

The federal judge in the Florida Mar-a-Lago case rebuked Biden’s henchmen for wasting her time with their antics, and she has suspended the schedule in that case. It is widely expected now that a trial in that ill-advised prosecution will not occur before the election, which removes it as an obstacle to Trump’s reelection.

Federal prosecutors indicted two of Trump’s low-level aides who have not turned against Trump as Biden’s henchmen hoped. The premise of that prosecution is that Trump was endangering national security at Mar-a-Lago, an absurd allegation unsupported by the evidence.

That leaves the federal prosecution of Trump in the anti-Trump venue of D.C. as Biden’s last remaining card to play against his opponent. But that case, which was supposed to be smooth sailing for the Trump-haters, has hit rocky waters too.

Special prosecutor Jack Smith demanded and obtained a severely improper gag order to prohibit Trump from disparaging Biden’s hired guns. Trump echoed the views of many by calling Jack “deranged” and a “thug,” who then persuaded the Obama-appointed judge to censor Trump despite strong objections by the ACLU to this infringement on the First Amendment.

But on Friday the D.C. Circuit suspended the gag order, thereby enabling Trump to speak freely again. Meanwhile, Trump’s attorneys have filed a compelling motion to toss the entire case out based on the presidential immunity that protects Trump against the allegations concerning actions he took on January 6, 2021, when he was still the president.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.