Israel Strikes Only Catholic Church In Gaza: Killing 3 And Wounding Pastor

And we're live. Welcome back to the LOOPcast. It's Tom, Erika, and Josh. The LOOPcast, of course, brought to you by The Loop, every American Catholic's favorite morning newsletter. Happy Friday, everyone, especially those here live with us in the chat, 11 a.m. Eastern Time, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. It's going to be a great show. We have a lot prepared for you. These are days that I'm really thankful we have a robust, excellent news team. So, reports came in that the only Catholic church in Gaza was just struck by an Israeli tank.

A shell. And so, we are going to provide all angles to that, the event that happened itself, the reactions that prompted all over the Catholic world, including the Pope himself, and Pete Zabala in Jerusalem. We're going to hear from what the IDF has to say, and then we also have some extra reporting on tensions broader in the region, say, in the West Bank, based on some original reporting from our own team here. So, I'm great to be moderated, I think, by Josh and Erika, who have excellent instincts and tastes as well.

And our own news team, so I think that's going to be excellent. Also, we are going to be talking about the NPR funding, that entire saga. Don't worry, we have good news. We have Twilight Zone like we do every show. Erika also released another excellent monologue that I'm excited to answer some questions about. And finally, I'm really thankful to her, Dr. Christina Francis from Applog. She is actually an OBGYN in Fort Wayne, Indiana, so nice to have another Hoosier on the show.

She came to talk about the letter that they published and sent to the HHS. Over Mifepristone, the abortion drug, and the type of safety that they want to bring back to women going through that horrible process, and around the country. So, it's going to be a great, full show. We actually don't have any ads, so before we get into comments. Well, you said APLOG. We should just let people know. We're talking about the American Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs. Yes, and just the salt of the earth type people.

I couldn't believe Dr. Christina Francis. What I especially appreciate about her is she works on the ground. She works as an OBGYN right now. She's on the board of Hoosiers for Life, I think Indiana Right to Life. She's a fantastic woman. I'm so grateful for her time. It's going to be a quick one, 10 minutes at the end, so stick around for that. But now we get into the news here. So, coming in yesterday, the only Catholic church in Gaza was struck by a tank shell from an Israeli tank.

So, we have a picture here just for perspective. I can zoom in a little bit. Here is the church before, and then I have the church after this struck, and it struck right about at the steeple of the cross. This was the picture I saw pretty much everywhere, but if you look on the side profile, pretty much destroyed. Really, go ahead. The roof, you're saying? The roof was pretty much destroyed.

So, the attack killed three people and injured the parish priest, Fr. Gabriel Romanelli. He is a friend of Pope Francis. They talked about it a lot, but they had him. On regular FaceTime towards the end of Pope Francis' life, so immediately pray for the repose of the soul of these fellow Christians living in Gaza. The exact story is an Israeli tank struck Gaza's only Catholic parish, Holy Family Parish, July 17th, killing three, injuring several others. The strike triggered strong reactions from several world leaders, including President Donald Trump and Pope Leo himself.

For perspective, Christians in the Holy Land are about 2% of that population, very small. So, Pope Leo, we hear from pretty much immediately, I'm deeply saddened to learn of the loss of life and injury caused by the military attack on the Holy Family Catholic Church in Gaza. I assure the parish community of my spiritual closeness. I commend the souls of the deceased to the loving mercy of Almighty God and pray for their families and the injured. I renew my call for an immediate ceasefire.

Only dialogue and reconciliation can ensure enduring peace. And then we quickly get from Pizza Ball, he's the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem. Actually, many were saying he was a favorite to be pope. I personally am glad he is where he is. I think he's very needed.

New statement, quote, strongly condemns this targeting of innocent civilians and of a sacred place. The Patriarch said three people have now died, nine are wounded. He actually later was interviewed this morning. He actually went to the church. They had mass in the church, and he's currently in Gaza, but he was interviewed by an Italian newspaper, and I thought at this point, gloves are really off. He's really saying a lot of strong words. So, authoritative voice that rose high against the horror of massacre of civilians in Gaza.

Cracked by bitterness yesterday. We are very worried about the injured, and there are still some serious ones in hospitals can't do much. Before launching an appeal, it's time to stop this war. It has always been absurd, and it's even more senseless. Today, they affected Christians, but every day, dozens of people still die in the Strip. And then he was asked, how has the situation changed since the beginning of the Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip? It's gotten a lot worse. In what respect?

Both from the point of view of military conflict and the destruction of homes and property. But above all, because of hunger. There's a lot of it. There's a lack of hospitals. There's also very little water. You haven't thought for a moment, is it time to leave? He answered, absolutely not. We stay, whatever happens. Next question, there are those in Italy who are calling for the cooperation treaty with Israel to be suspended. Do you think these political initiatives that can help? I don't know.

I'm a friar. The necessary pressure must be put in place to bring about the end of the war. Is it optimistic? Should be. I am a man of faith. I have hope. Wow. Very strong statements. I'll round out before we get into more comprehensive coverage. So, you actually got a statement from President Trump himself, and then it was delivered by Caroline Leavitt. So, here's one asked about what happened. This is how the response was struck by him. Good afternoon, Caroline. In Gaza today, a holy family Catholic church was struck by an Israeli shell.

Three people were killed, ten wounded. What is the president's reaction to that church coming under fire? It was not a positive reaction. He called. I spoke to Prime Minister Netanyahu this morning to address the strikes on that church in Gaza, and I understand the Prime Minister agreed to put out a statement. It was a mistake by the Israelis to hit that Catholic church. That is what the Prime Minister relayed to the President, and you should look at the Prime Minister's statement.

So, I do actually have a statement from the IDF at this point. I do, again, want to be comprehensive, share all sides here. Um, statement from prime minister's office, Israel deeply regrets that a stray ammunition hit Gaza's holy family church. Every innocent life lost as a tragedy. We share the grief of families and the faithful. We are grateful to Pope Leo for his words of comfort. Israel is investigating the incident and remains committed to protecting civilians and holy sites. Any thoughts gang?

I got more context I can add. Well, I mean, I would hope it's a mistake, because if you were intentionally targeting a Catholic church in Gaza, your government deserves to fall. It's like, it would be so atrocious. There's a lot of Catholics across the country and the world who are just thinking to themselves, like, this is the leader of a country who's our friend? How does this stuff happen? You know, it's the only church in the entire area, the only Catholic church in the entire area of Gaza, and it gets hit by a tank shell?

Like, come on, guys. And like, here's the thing. This is the kind of stuff that you'd expect maybe 30 years ago. But with precision instruments these days, it's that much harder, I think, to have these mistakes. So, I don't know. I mean, I'm not a military expert, so it just doesn't look good at all. Yeah, I mean, the IDF is, and I've defended Israel on this program for, they are known for, they boast that they are the most precise. military in the world, and you think of, like, their attack at the cell phones, right, last year when Mossad went in, they got the cell phones, and the whole narrative there was, we are so good at this, we're going to minimize the loss of civilian life, we're doing cell phones, so we're only going to, you know, harm or kill or maim actual terrorists because we did this operation.

And then you see something like, well, this was a mistake from a tank. The tank was, what, like 200 yards away? Do we even know yet? And it's, yeah, it's hard to understand how that is possible. Same with the missile strike. I believe a church last year, was it a Greek church, a Greek Orthodox church? It was St. Porphyrius. Yeah, Porphyrius. Yeah, they were, yeah, I see it. It killed 18 and injured many. It is one of the oldest Christian churches in the world.

Yeah, you can kind of say, okay, well, with a missile, from a long-range missile, something happens, the wind blows, I don't know, it goes off by a few hundred yards or whatever, but, I mean, an on-site tank that is on the ground, I mean, come on, guys, this is, this is not.

And I'm going to get into the statements on the settler violence. I mean, in this interview with Pete Zabala, he said people on the ground do not believe this is a mistake. That's just what he's hearing from being there today, literally there. It's hard to really imagine that this is a mistake at this point. For just a second, like, you know, it would be one thing for a church leader to think that. It's quite another for him to say it out loud.

Yeah. That was pretty striking in my mind. Yeah, and I'm honestly grateful people are talking about him being Pope. I'm glad that he's right where he is. This is clearly a man of courage and tact, and it's not an easy situation to be there. I will say, as someone that's been critical on this program of the IDF and Israel and the actions specifically in Gaza, they do, I don't dispute they have the right to defend themselves, and I am sympathetic in the need to respond to the horrific terrorist attack.

Propagated by Hamas. It is completely unacceptable to bomb churches and holy sites, and I would say I'm actually happy in some ways because I myself kind of have my own moments of discovery through different news events, and of course, the fog of war is tough to get through, but when I kind of came around to the reality of the situation that's going on there, it's now hard for me to say I saw online.

People seeing that this Catholic church was hit and killed three people and injured the pastor and said, well, this is Hamas' fault. This is all Hamas' fault. First, the reaction should be, I'm really sad that a church was bombed and that people died. And they're worshipping. That's really the first thing that needs to be said. And the other thing, too, is I was going through to try to understand more of the context. There's 117 religious sites that were reportedly damaged. The BBC came back and verified that 70, this is in 2024, mind you, 74 of these mosques had been destroyed.

Now, Am I also sympathetic that, yeah, people could be hiding under there, they could be tunneled, or whatever? Yeah. It's completely unacceptable, and we've all agreed in the Geneva Accords to bomb holy sites. Not to bomb them. Especially if there are inovants, not to bomb them. It's unacceptable. It's not acceptable if it's a Catholic church. If it's a mosque, it does not matter. If innocent people are in there, if someone were to take hostages in a school, you don't blow up the school with the kids inside of it.

It's unacceptable. It's unbecoming of a developed nation to conduct warfare in that way. Okay. So, I think this is really, really, Pope Leo called Netanyahu, I'm seeing this, this is going to be one of the first, I think, of events that hopefully really change public perception to how this war is being taken out, the war against Hamas, and that it needs to be conducted in a civil way. And what we saw today wasn't civil, and it rightfully should enrage Catholics and Christians.

Yeah, I agree. I agree on that. I think... I think public perception has shifted, and I would say it is actually mainstream now, at this point in the war, starting with October 7th and moving to now. I think that the sympathies with Israel that were obviously like... Very justified in the aftermath of October 7th. I would say, at this point, it's already mainstream to be more that Gaza is the victim. The mainstream media has that. Basically, if you're a leftist, if you're a Democrat, that's already what you've said, or what you've sort of accepted as what's going on here.

What I hope, like you said, is that this pushes it to the point where the United States, and Mike Huckabee came out with, he's the ambassador in Jerusalem, right? He came out with strong statements following violence against Palestinians in the West Bank as well, which we've been covering those stories over the last couple of weeks. But that the United States can start to say something like, okay, we are allies, we are helping you, we do want to destroy Hamas. But here's what can't happen, right?

Like, we have to come out with very strong statements, and hopefully the Israelis can respond. Oh, Tom left. Oh, now he's on the right. He just wanted to change seats, and now I'm on the right. Whoa, this is like musical chairs here.

Now I'm back. Go ahead. So, yeah, I agree that I hope that this is a turning point in the kind of pressure that we can bring to bear. The thing that makes me absolutely nauseous just reading this story, other than, I mean, first of all, the loss of life. Second of all, the targeting of the house of God. But thirdly, just the temperature is so hot over there right now, and hearing Pete Zabola come out, like you said, Josh, hearing a churchman come out and say something like, I don't know if this was deliberate or not, right?

That's not what we're saying on the ground. The temperature is just so high there, and I think it's hard for us to sit here in the United States in our air-conditioned homes, like drinking our coffee in the morning, watching footage like this, to understand.

So, to even grasp that on both sides of this conflict, like you have the Israelis who suffered the October 7th, who have been listening for decades since the Ayatollahs took over to Iran, a much larger country, they have 10 times the population, say something like, we want to destroy Israel and eradicate it from the earth. And not only that, but start three or four proxy wars. Oh, Tom left again. He's mad about what I'm saying. All right. But start all these proxy wars through Hamas, through Hezbollah, through what's the third one?

The Houthis, right? Down in Yemen. So, you have this existential threat going on there and living through that for 40 years, and then you have the way that Israel has reacted to October 7th. Just, I don't think we can grasp for any side, really.

Exactly. To make a judgment, in a way, on what is going on, what it is like. I just think that we should push back at sort of absolutist or binary thinking. 100%. Here is one of the things about fanaticism. The reason why fanaticism is so pernicious is that it can even corrupt its opponents, right? So, like... You know, in World War II, we were faced with, like, demonically evil Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler's leadership, and also, like, almost like suicidal imperialism of Japan, and, you know, when you see what Japan had done to, you know, to prisoners of war and that kind of stuff, like, take no prisoners, they're just horrible, evil people, you're like, We have to do something.

Like, you know, I would talk to my grandfather, one of the gentlest souls I ever met, and I'm sure that he is in heaven. I mean, I pray for the repose of his soul. And I'd ask him about, you know, whether or not it would be okay to use the nuclear bomb on civilian targets like we did in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I'm convinced it was immoral.

But I wasn't going to lecture my grandfather. He served in the Navy. He was in the Pacific Theater there. He was on a destroyer, and he would talk about it, like how evil the enemy was, and so I have to, you know, like there is that humility you have to take to any situation and understand it. So, like. Here's what I would say. I think there's a lot of people in this country that just have known for the last 50, 60, 70 years that there are fanatical, evil Islamic extremists who want to kill every single Jew they ever see.

They want to get rid of the State of Israel. They want to wipe it off the face of the earth. They want to wipe it off the map. They publicly claim this. It's not like a hidden secret. Right. And therefore, you think, you know, Israel's like, This is a massive existential threat. We had millions of our people killed in Nazi Germany, and now we finally have our own homeland, and they want to wipe us off the map, so they feel like anything is justified, and I can understand why they think that, but that is actually not true.

Just because you are dealing with fanatical evil does not mean you are allowed to do whatever you want to do, and so here is what gets to be frustrating about this. When Christians say, Hey, listen, wait a minute. These actions by the Israeli government are not justified. Just because the attack on October 7th was evil and malicious and an atrocity doesn't mean you can wipe away tons of people. I'm sorry, there are still basic rules of warfare. You can't bomb churches.

You can't intentionally kill innocent people. You can't kill 50,000 women and children. It frustrates me when Christians then speak about this kind of stuff and say, whoa, the Israeli government is losing the plot here. They're going way too far, way too far. They're still just war principles. And some people's minds here in the United States, they're like, wait a minute.

Are you, you're against the Israeli government? What are you, for these fanatically evil Islamic murderers? Like, oh, okay, wait a minute now. No, no, I'm not. Like, you can be against this bloodthirsty, maniacal fanaticism that wants to kill every Jew ever, and still say, gee, some of these actions the Israeli government is doing in response is unjustified.

Some of it is justified, but some of it is not. Nuance. Don't be afraid of it. Two things can be true at once. Right, right. Two things can be true at once, and that is why I really love the news team here and talking to you guys, because I feel like we are able to have productive conversation about it, and it is so obvious online that most people have been so severely propagandized, and then also affected by the ability of social media to just pop off immediately and say something that is completely nonsensical and not helpful.

I will say, at this point in time, some other things to be made aware of here, so we had some original reporting from the CatholicVote team here. Priests of West Bank's only remaining all-Christian town issue urgent appeal against Israeli settler violence. And so, we have the letter down here. It's signed by the three heads. So, that is the Latin Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, and the Melkite, or is it? Yeah, Melkite Greek Catholic Church. They raise their voices on behalf of the people of our town and parishioners to strongly condemn the ongoing and grave series of attacks targeting Taiba.

And so, actually, our team went and talked to some people on the ground there. And so, one of these villages that have been getting attacked on the West Bank by Israeli settlers is this town of Taiba, 10 miles north of Jerusalem. Taiba is 100% Christian. This is Nadine Corey, told CatholicVote via phone on Friday, a resident of Taiba. Corey is the founder of Taiba Brewery, colloquially known as Taiba Beer. Quote, last month, they went inside 14 homes and broke the doors while people were sleeping.

Last harvest, they didn't allow people to go to their groves to harvest their olive oil. Last week, he went on, settlers brought sheep to graze on the crops of hardworking locals, ruining their businesses. They, quote, ate all the wheat and barley that the farmers were growing on the mountains of Taiba. Wednesday night, he went on, they broke into people's homes to kick them out, and when the residents resisted, attackers burned the homes. There's nothing we can do. It's a peaceful village, very quiet.

I have a family tree of 600 years in Taiba. I'm not going to leave. For people curious on some footage of these attacks, it's all over social media at this point, but. Yeah, horrific. Burned cars, people going into homes. It's really hard to watch, but serious violence going on.

And mostly Christian Taiba on the West Bank. We also have a 20-year-old Palestinian-American was reportedly killed July 11th in an alleged attack by Israeli settlers on the West Bank, prompting his family in Florida to demand a formal investigation by the U.S. State Department.

His name is Saif Musalit. He's a U.S. citizen. He was born in Tampa. He was beaten to death, reportedly, by Israeli soldiers near the village of Sinji at the Holy Land, according to multiple reports. He was beat to death by clubs, and then they blocked medics from reaching him. Hours after the beating, his brother tried to take him to an ambulance and the victim died before arriving at the hospital. From the family, quote, this is an unimaginable nightmare and injustice that no family should have to face.

The family said, we demand the U.S. State Department lead an immediate investigation and hold the Israeli settlers who killed Saif accountable for their crimes. So, at this point, this is just reporting from us. I'm happy that the Pope and Pete Zabala are leading on this. We need a peaceful resolution in that region, and it has to come from somewhere. Even we're asking Pete Zabala, he's like, I'm a friar, but I understand that injustice is happening here and that people need to raise their voices, and I'd like the United States to be a part of that.

My issue, too, is that shell most likely came from the United States, and you can't just close your eyes and say that we're not involved here. We very much fund the military of the IDF. And allow them to act with the impunity that they act currently. If anything, that should mean we should hold higher sway over how they conduct their warfare, and we need to call them on that. It's that simple. We are complicit in this, by the way, and we should be able to say, hey, just continue.

That's why I'm glad President Trump called him, and I hope he gave him the right act, and I hope Secretary of State Marco Rubio also puts the squeeze on this, because we expect better. 100%. Yeah, absolutely. Expect better. So, yeah, if everyone... Could just pray for that region, and pray for both sides. The funny thing about all this, as critical as I've been of the IDF, if this was happening to Israelis right now, say if Palestinians were going over in settlements, and burning houses, and murdering citizens, as we condemn the October 7th stuff, same way.

If we hit a Catholic church in Israel, if someone did, I'd be condemning it too. So, I think the problem with the conversation is, the nuance isn't applied. It's very hard line one side or the other, and I think it just As Josh said, it creates radicals on both sides, and it is just going to continue creating that unless we can have an open conversation. And I really like, for example, I did that interview with Jason Jones, who is there as a Catholic on the ground serving the people, trying to get them food because they have been starved out.

And it is through the lens of human dignity that we view this situation. And guess what? If you are Muslim, you have human dignity. If you are Jewish, you have human dignity. The Catholic anthropology should lead here and treat everyone in the region with dignity and not just excuse barbarism from both sides. So, let us get started. It is relevant to keep up. I highly recommend subscribing to The Loop. We have done a fantastic job, I think, trying to moderate both sides, trying to come forward with the best reporting we can have to offer, because I also will say it is hard to verify reporting coming from both sides, because it is funded, in large part, by both sides of the issue.

The first Trump term, we saw progress in having other countries like Qatar and UAE recognized. Right, with the Abraham Accords. I just hope that Trump and Rubio can, you know, again, exert their diplomatic influence here and try to bring about some sort of peace. Let's hope.

Yeah. Erika, now if you can get into NPR and PBS. I woke up this morning. But my video and audio is in sync, so I'm going to drop out. Okay, sounds good. All right, so I woke up this morning to great news on the entertainment front. One, this is just an aside, the late night show with Stephen Colbert is going to be canceled. No more kaposh as of next May, so that's just a little, but we also have, isn't that great news?

You know who lamented that? Oh. The official chaplain of the Stephen Colbert Show. Yes, Father James Martin is sad that the voice of Stephen Colbert, which brings such education to the American people, will be no more. And I say, hee hee hee.

Chef's kiss. So, no more Colbert, and NPR PBS are screaming that we won't have Elmo either. So, you know, just a great day. It's going to be awesome, but here we go. Here's the story of five decade-long battle. Ended this week as the Senate voted to claw back $1.1 billion in funds to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, starting with over $500 million cuts in just the next year, which includes, of course, NPR and PBS. A little backstory, because I have Josh here and the two of us together, which is going to become a history show.

PBS and NPR were created in 1967. Year that many great things happened, right? Not. Its creation was spurred along by the declaration of Newton and Minow, who was the chairman of the FCC during the Kennedy administration. And they were complaining, they were trying to address the problem that the competition for ratings and ad dollars had turned television into, quote, a vast wasteland of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood, and thunder. And so Minow, he's a besieged broadcaster to make, quote, this is just so progressive liberal, make a conscientious good faith effort to serve the public interest with higher quality fare.

Subsidized by the taxpayer, followed by an influential study on, quote, educational television from the Carnegie Corporation. It concluded that the federal government should finance the system of stations to produce programming that was of human interest and importance with regard for the free market incentives of ratings without regard for the free market incentives of ratings or ad revenue, because those stupid people don't know what's good for them. It's like the cornflakes of the entertainment world. We got it, PBS. The Johnson administration did just that, in line with its Great Society program, which was just another awesome idea coming out of the late 60s.

Immediately, the Nixon administration comes in. Josh, you're a fan of the Nixon administration in some ways, many ways, and Pat Buchanan, who was working for them, was like, this is a terrible idea. Cut it off. End it. Don't do it. But obviously, we just couldn't stop ourselves. So, now we have cut off the funding, and I would like to just characterize for you a little bit the journey of grief that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting has gone through. Please. And with denial, right?

Wait, would you like some sad music out of this? Yeah, can we get a little bit of a soundtrack going here? Yeah, do you have any tiny violin we could go with? All right, start playing the violin. Tiny violin's going. Go for it. So, first of all is denial, right? The first messaging was, we don't care. Take away our funding. Our federal funding is only like... 1% of our programming anywhere. And just a reminder for everyone in the chat, I looked this up because we covered it.

In 2023, NPR and PBS left Twitter in protest. Oh, yes. I remember this. Remember? And why did they leave in protest? Do you remember, Josh? Because Elon Musk had identified NPR and PBS on Twitter with a little marker saying state-affiliated media because they get subsidies from the federal government. And boy, oh boy, did the journos hate that. They did, and in fact, they protested that their funding was so trivial that this designation was unfair and inaccurate. So, that was the first thing.

Take it away, boys. They're like, fine, it's not a big deal. Yeah, they're singing our sad song. So, then it turned to, just kidding, this is terrible. Give us our money back because you're destroying us by removing our federal funding, which quickly pivoted to... People are going to die because lives depend on access to NPR. Wait a second. You just got to play this one. Hold up. This is Chuck Schumer on the Senate floor. Man, historically popular Chuck Schumer right now.

Well, yeah, I think it's 19%. You are so addicted to government money. I mean, it is kind of nice, right? I mean, I wish I got free money. I mean. See Republicans just axed educational programming? When people see Republicans just axed Sesame Street? To pay for tax cuts to billionaires, when rural Americans see Republicans not just betrayed them and defunded public radio, sometimes the only source in rural areas so vital to natural disasters, and it's the only news source there, consequences will be severe.

Americans will remember. Wait, do you remember when... Uh, was it the governor of New York said black people couldn't figure out laptops? Right, right. Similar to brown people can't get government IDs because they have all these old talking points. I mean, like, gosh, you don't, you're gonna, you know, you're gonna kill Big Bird. Oh, people in rural areas rely on public radio. But what about Mr. Rogers? It's like, you know what, we know you've been pushing out a bunch of rainbow filth.

If I want to watch rainbow filth for kids. I can go onto YouTube and watch Ms. Rachel, or whatever her name is. Oh, that's part of Ms. Rachel. Josh. I just don't care. You don't care about the rural Americans. I was concerned. Chuck Schumer, a lawyer. I live in rural America. I know.

I grew up in rural America. I have high-speed internet, Chuck. Oh, my gosh. So, I did my research. I did do my research, and I went, and I looked it up. All right. Perplexity. What was that? Perplexity. Yes. How many rural Americans own smartphones? Turns out, currently 71% of rural Americans own smartphones. How many have access to high-speed internet? 77.4%. This is from the NIH, too. No friend of- And also, could we also get an initiative to give people less smartphones?

I think we'd all be better off if we had less. Yes, but if 77% of rural Americans have access to high-speed internet- You don't need NPR. You don't need it. And in fact, so I looked into this. I was like, you know, NPR, and they're so concerned right now about rural Americans' access to high-speed internet. I was like, gosh, I wonder what they thought about Pete Buttigieg's failure to spend the $42 billion on getting access to them. So, I went and I looked that up, too.

Look at NPR's coverage. They did an exit interview with Pete Buttigieg. Back on January 12th, and I was like, they must have really hammered him on this, right? NPR, exit interview of Pete Buttigieg. Not once did they bring up the fact that he had failed to bring high-speed internet to Americans with 42 billion. So, they really obviously didn't actually care about this, but I digress.

So, I also noticed that the coverage of this failed to mention how many people actually are listening to NPR and watching PBS. None of the reports from the New York Times gave me a hard number. None of the reports from CNN or MSNBC gave me a hard number. So, I went back and looked at NPR. NPR editor-in-chief Edith Chapin reported last year, in 2024.

More than two-thirds of our broadcast audience is over 45, and for more than five years, the only age demographic that has grown in that audience are those over 65. Listeners have held steady at NPR at just under about a million a week for the last seven years. That's for all their shows? What drives me so crazy about this is that if you didn't have total... communists working at all these organizations they could have done merchandising deals that were actually beneficial to themselves and they can fund all the crap they're doing with this tickle me almost toys and they'd be fine there's they have no need for government dollars but again exactly why would the thing is government money is an addiction and when you get it it's so hard to say no it's like free money who doesn't love free money so these people are crazy I just sent you a link here.

They're asking, you know, the CEO of NPR was saying, well, what do you find so objectionable? Tell me. Tell me what it is. And our good friends at Susan B. Anthony listed it. Yeah, I can tell. Oh, my gosh.

NPR airing audio of a woman having an abortion. Unbelievable. So, so dark. I feel like this is, okay, Josh, explain this to me. Explain this to me. Explain this to me. I thought we already hashed this all out when NPR said, hey, we're not going to cover the Hunter Biden laptop story because it's not worthy of coverage, or when the whistleblower came forward and said, every member of our editorial team is a Democrat. There's no Republicans on it. It's not bipartisan at all.

How many insane stories about just eating bugs and ridiculous gay stuff do we need to bring up? You just have to do this at this point, right? You just have to be so shameless and be like, we are... The lifeblood, after saying, we don't need you, now we need you.

They were debating this stuff, and someone was like, hey, wait a minute, NPR, we had William F. Buckley on here for so many years. Dude, the last time he was on the show was 1999. You have to go back 25 years. We're so fair and balanced.

What was the stat on Morning Wire? That was last century. Right, yeah, the stat on Morning Wire, someone went in and did a ratio comparison of The number of times that NPR uses the term far-right and far-right extremist versus the number of times they identified someone as far-left or far-left extremist is 1 to 42.

42 to 1. So, it's 42 to 1. So, for every 42 times they talk about far right, in which they include like J.D. Vance as far right. Me? Right, you. You're far right. Anyone that would like to sit there for a while. They mention far left once. Anyone who likes to eat meat. Yeah, you like meat. Oh, yeah. I found you that headline, Josh. I found Josh's favorite headlines. NPR's obsession with the John the Baptist diet. This was like...

In the last 10 years, they've run, I don't know how many, like 25 stories on why we should be eating insects and not beef in the United States. And you're just like… Praying the rosary. Oh, far, far away. Vote Christianity to get us to submit to their regime. Again, they use your views as a skin. They conquer you. I hate it. So, these people deserve nothing but to be laid off. And I just think we just don't hate journalists enough. I mean, like, for example, you have that story.

Didn't we talk about it on the last episode about the Coldsplay concert? We did not talk about the Coldsplay concert. We did not. Okay, it went crazy viral over the internet the last few days. This guy, the CEO of this company, is at a Coldsplay concert, and he's got his arms around this woman. It looks like they're girlfriend, boyfriend, or maybe they're married. Oh, they're definitely married.

They're married to other people. Other people. And it's just like, you're like, oh my gosh, this is a kind of a, you know, this blew up, of course, on the internet. And actually, people were, the good thing about it was that people were like, you know, upset, rightly, shaming them. Like, how could you do that? Like, here's the thing. Guys, I'm telling you, you don't hate journalists enough, because, of course, journalists will support and sponsor the most heinous things. Here we go.

This is from, was it last year? I just want us to tell you that you don't hate journalists enough. From the New York Magazine, we had this article last year, in defense of adulterers. Oh, my gosh. I got to say, Josh, I'm taking the other end on this. That's a great headline.

It is. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, I made it. Obviously, you know, you're like, oh, it's clickbait, but no, I mean, she actually was in, right? It was really defending adultery. Oh, totally stupid, but isn't, the whole crux of this is like, okay, the New Yorker mag, if they can fund their weird activities and headlines, then fine. Like, there's a cottage industry for people that really want the hard takes from the New York mag. Great. I just think we need to remember, what is the job of reporters to cover the news with a pillow until it's...

Die. That's the whole point. I mean, like, what I'm getting at with this is, like, I feel like quoting the great general, William Tecumseh Sherman. Sorry, you Southerners. He said, if I had a choice, I would kill every reporter in the world, but I am sure we would be getting reports from hell before breakfast.

Okay, actually, on that point, Josh. Uh, Stephen Colbert showdown. Yeah. Okay. Oh, I was doing that while you were gone. We mentioned that. Oh, okay. Yeah, you missed it. So, it's not just, so. NPR, of course, irrelevant. The Stephen Colbert show, completely irrelevant. This used to mean something. Some people were saying, oh, it's like the Jon Stewart effect, because he actually was talented and came up with interesting takes. Jon Stewart, you're right, is the key point on all this, because the thing is, he still understood effective comedy and effective laughs, and he was the hinge point.

He changed it into being point and shame and mock and laugh, not real actual humor. And he was able to, he still knew enough of the old school kind of humor. He was very effective. I remember him doing a set on Saturday Night Live, like 15, 20 years ago on gay marriage, and I remember thinking, this is so funny and so disastrous. But then the comics after him have no talent. They don't have the understanding. They don't have the skill set.

And so, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers. Jimmy Fallon. Jimmy Fallon is actually funny when it comes to doing a musical lip sync stuff, but actual comedy is not. So, none of these guys are good, and all of them are toast. I mean, you're right. This used to be a massive deal. When I was growing up, I was like, okay, who's going to pass Carson? Is it going to be Letterman? Is it going to be Leno? There's all these fights. No one cares anymore.

Greg Gutfield gets more traffic, more audience, more eyeballs on his show on a cable news TV. So, interesting. And I'm not even a Gutfeld guy, personally, probably because of my age, but I'm not saying he's bad. I just don't know anything about him. All relevant.

Journalism. There is this guy who is Andrew Callahan, Channel 5 News. It is funny. He made that as a joke, basically, but he goes himself with two guys, and he covers all the biggest events going on in the country. He is pretty open about his bias. He grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He is probably more liberal, but he is extremely talented, and it is hard to dispute he is going to the ground and talking to people. He has covered them.

Who are you talking about? His name is Andrew Callahan. Channel 5 News, and he's got very much like my era of journalism, where he's got a ton of humor. He somehow finds a freestyle rapper everywhere he goes. He was in Israel and found a freestyle rapper. It's crazy. But he covered the Israel-Iran situation, in my opinion, with a lot more honesty and integrity than most major news networks, or, for example, late-night shows that people aren't watching anymore. Journalism simultaneously is Easier than ever, and harder than ever.

Because it is easier for anyone to just get a camera or a phone. You can just go with your phone, and you can put something together creatively, and you have the means to get it in front of thousands of people. So, that to me is why Tucker made a smart pivot. I am not sure if it is on purpose, but he moved to podcast, to YouTube, and he does not even have an internet connection. He just does what he wants and throws it out there, and nothing else.

I can tell it is honest, or he really believes in his money. Yes, but he has had a few clunky months here. Right, but he is honest. That is the thing. It is all about honesty as a currency. Does anyone think Stephen Colbert is honest? No, Stephen Kluber is the ultimate stenographer for the regime. I mean, like, remember the Vax scene? Oh, never mind. I'll never forget it.

I mean, these guys are pathetic. I mean, like, you know, the idea is that there's supposed to be a court gesture that would poke fun at everybody, you know, but they wouldn't go too risky, of course, because they don't want to, you know, it's still a business. But, you know, there's supposed to be the court gesture that would make fun of both sides or whatever, and it would be playful. You know, but this time, they become partisan. They're like, they just point and attack conservatives.

And it's not playful. It's vicious. It is absolutely vicious. Democrats and Republicans both would watch Johnny Carson. Let me push back on your Tucker comment briefly, because I somewhat agree. There's been two I've listened to where I was like, these people are slimeballs and untrustworthy. George Santos, one of them for sure. And then I couldn't even get through the first. 20 minutes. I'm like, you spent $800 of campaign finances on Botox? Like, yeah, I'm done listening to you. And then the other one was, he was like a car guy, and I got a slimy feeling from him.

But at least I have the opportunity to make that assessment, and I believe that Tucker's operating in good faith of just being curious and asking questions. Like, he interviewed the president of Iran. How have we not, in the Western world, heard from the president of Iran, who was translated over to us, and do I believe everything he says? No. But it is actually important, kind of like contextual information, to be like, what is the president of Iran signaling to the American people through Tucker?

I just, sometimes we are like, I just like that he is authentic. Okay, sure. I mean, authenticity is better than fakeness. Stephen Colbert is the ultimate in fakeness, I give you that. But the fakeness authenticity scale isn't the only thing. I felt like Tucker was contributing much more to the conversation when he was at Fox, and instead of just interviewing every single rando, I mean, I don't know. I 100% disagree with that. I think his reach is much bigger, and he's much more influential with younger people.

I never watched Tucker before he went independent. Well, anyway, we're talking about Stephen Colbert, and we're talking about NPR, and I just think that, by the way, the Stephen Colbert announcement is interesting in the fact that, like, the institution of late-night talk show is totally gone. They're not replacing.

You saved it as your... Twilight Zone, about Shane Gillis or whatever. We'll get into that later. Here's an example. Somebody was saying, well, why doesn't, you know, if CBS had real cojones, they would basically go to Shane Gillis and say, take over.

Take over the show. And I'm like, that would be a move, but I still think. All these institutions are going to die. Well, my take is they wouldn't do it. All the national hosts are all going to die. Right, they wouldn't do it, but my other take is they don't have any leverage anymore, because Shane Gillis has the ability to reach a larger audience in CBS right now, today, than CBS ever could. So, what do they have to offer? Why would I do that?

Right, what do they have to offer Tucker? Same thing. He has a bigger audience than Fox, probably, and he could get on Fox. His numbers are probably bigger across the board. So, there's no reason. That's why you see with... People are even speculating about the daily wire model, or just companies that have big personalities. Megyn Kelly leaving, for example. They can get whatever they want to get out there much quicker, much faster, and in the way they want to, exactly. They don't have a cartel on distribution anymore.

So, why? You could just be honest and provide a different perspective, and that's why I think you're missing a lot. Not everyone can. I mean, Megyn Kelly, Joe Rogan, some of these people can pull it off. Tucker Stokes, well, my contention with him is that some of his people... I think he's brought some clowns on lately, but I do like Tucker. My point is, not everyone's going to be able to do that route. We've got to get to the good news.

We don't need to get into it. Yeah, Tucker's a lightning rod, but I do think... That's the point, because the whole point of my contention about the news cycle and that there's somehow this golden era of Walter Cronkite, he was nonpartisan, he never, it's total garbage, and it actually is a historical anomaly, because there used to be a time when there were two very vocal, competing factions of news that represented the parties. There were extensions of the political parties in America, and we're getting much closer back to that.

That's what it was in the 19th century, and the 21st century is much This 20th century was, you are right, a total anomaly, and it was in service of the regime. Totally, and it justified all kinds of atrocities in terms of war, and then what happened in Vietnam, what happened in Iraq. It was bad. I just think, overall, it was too cozy with the regime. Now, it is independent. I think that is a good thing for the country in terms of if you want to be informed about different perspectives.

Anyway, I'm loving the chat right now. I'm listening to you guys. I'm just watching the chat. You guys are great. Ah, someone's getting after me on me listening to Tucker. Yeah, I listen to Tucker sometimes. Geez, I listen to a lot of different people. All right. All right, Erika, what do you got? So, you don't have to. Okay, good news. Oh, I loved this. This was great. I think we did a little clip for Instagram or something. I'm not on Instagram, but...

Charlie Kirk, hanging out with Michael Knowles, hanging out with Matt Walsh, starting to rub off a little bit. But let me first say, I think we as Protestants and Evangelicals under-venerate Mary. She was very important. She was a vessel for our Lord and Savior.

I think that we as Evangelicals and Protestants, we've over-corrected. We don't talk about Mary enough. We don't venerate her enough. Mary was clearly important to early Christians. There's something there. In fact, I believe one of the ways that we fix toxic feminism in America is Mary is the solution. Yes. Have more young ladies be pious, be reverent, to be full of faith, slow to anger, slow to words at times. Mary is a phenomenal example, and I think a counter to so much of the toxicity of feminism in the modern era.

There you go. Toxic femininity, that's true. Toxic femininity. Mary is the antidote. Thank you, Charlie Kirk. I do love to see one of my separated brethren come over and discover the joy of our Blessed Mother. She is the antidote. She is the go-to. And so, yeah, Charlie, come on in. The water's great.

By the way, just like Joseph is the right model for men, not Andrew Tate. Yep. Also a good point. Not Andrew. Absolutely. Okay, so, I beat this horse all the time, but it is worth saying again. In 2004, George W. Bush campaigned to try to enshrine in our Constitution that marriage should be between a man and a woman.

Days before he was sworn into office, he told through his friends that he was not going to push this at all, even though he campaigned on a... Federal Marriage Amendment. He was not even going to ask the Senate to vote on it. It was dead. It was all just a campaign gimmick. It was all just a bunch of crap. Donald Trump, right? He's the philanderer. He's horrible. George W. Bush loves his wife, and he gave up alcohol, blah, blah, blah. Donald Trump, for all his personal foibles, is a man who, I know this sounds crazy.

Lies a lot less than other politicians and delivers on his promises. He says, we're going to get rid of gender-affirming surgeries on kids, and what has happened? He's used his administration to say, we're going to cut off federal funds to you guys if you're providing gender mutilation therapies. So, the world's, the nation's largest gender mutilation factory shut. Down, just last week. Here's the... Executive actions protecting American children from irreversible chemical and surgical mutilation. The largest provider of these barbaric practices will now be closing its doors.

The facility in Los Angeles, California, is just the latest facility downsizing or eliminating their irreversible and harmful services that feed into the lie that you can somehow change a child's... Sex. The Biden administration peddled dangerous policies that defied medical science in favor of radical transgender ideology, but President Trump has put an end to that to ensure America's children's innocence is protected, and our children can lead healthy and productive lives. Following President Trump's vote. Okay, so here's what I'm trying to tell you, Christians.

There's a lot of Christians and Catholics both who are just like, my vote doesn't matter. Oh, all the politicians are terrible. Baloney. The vote for Donald Trump last November has seen a remarkable change on this policy. The mutilation of our children is something that is an abominable crime that we allowed to happen in this country for way too long, and now we are putting an end to it. This is a very visible way in which your vote last November made a difference, and it is going to make a difference in Because if he had lost, and Kamala Harris was in there, the money spigot for this kind of stuff would have continued.

So many children's lives would have been ruined, and decades later, they'd say, why did you allow this to happen? Where were you? You voted. Catholics voted for President Trump to stop this barbaric stuff. And I'm very thankful for it. Fire me up, Josh. I'm going to...

I'm going to save this one for the second one for the Twilight Zone. Okay, okay, okay. I will also say most people, I get a little bit annoyed at that when people are like, well, you know, if Trump would have won, there would have been gay race communism, which I pretty much agree with, as like a diss to shut down the Epstein stuff, which I'm still somewhat frustrated about.

You are correct on that. I think it is good for us to remember there is no question we are living in two different Americas if Trump does not win. First off, Trump would be in jail. Our border would still be wide open, most likely. Right.

Yeah, definitely. And the executive board is, a lot of them, fantastic. Okay, mine is going to be fun. Shout out to Brent Rooker. We got any baseball fans in here? I think he plays for the A's. So, he was at the All-Star game. Feeding his daughter.

Oh, he's got a bottle. Adorable video. Little baby girl. There's another one. His other daughter's just twirling around. Someone on Twitter said, hey, Rooker, do you really need to feed your baby on camera? Sometimes people just want to see you play, and he quote tweets it, yes, it was necessary to feed my 11th month old child her nighttime bottle at like 9 p.m. Thank you for asking.

Look at this Chad. This is a Chad right here. Good for you. I'm a new, well, Tigers first, but A's can be second. Moneyball. Shout out Brown Rooker. That's great. It's good to see your dads in the wild. Yeah, dad week. Man, you guys are awesome. We love your dad. Okay, so, oh, also, Erika's latest edition of The Deep, which is quickly becoming my favorite series of all time.

We'll play a little bit of this. So, we'll play the intro for you. This one was fun. This was really fun. I am a member of the 1%. No, not the yacht-owning kind. I mean, I'm a woman who can read. Hear me out. Historically, it is unheard of how privileged modern moms like me are. I grew up in a happy home, married to a guy who still loves and cares for me 22 years later. I've given birth seven times, and I never even died once.

I have antibiotics, I have clean water. Free speech, if I can keep it. But no, the internet insists motherhood is misery, with snack breaks. Consider this spicy girl boss debate. I recently saw Stephen Bartlett moderated feminists from two camps. We have babies are blessings ladies, like this one. It's the most incredible love you'll ever experience in your life. And the burn everything down and then eat it ladies, like that one. I think when we're talking about rules. We are really in dangerous water.

The claws came out. No. They shouldn't have. No, no, let me, can I finish? And as a mom of many kids, this one part in particular stuck out to me, and I had to share it with you along with my thoughts.

So, quick questions immediately. One, confirm, you haven't died once? No, not once. Nope. Okay. And second question, someone asked, what is your favorite snack that you take? Okay, so, like, guilty pleasure snack, I love chocolate chip cookies. I just, I cannot resist the chocolate chip cookie. I mean, I can, but I don't want to. You know what I, when the kids make chocolate chip cookies at the house, I always ask, For them to make three of the cookies without any of the chocolate chips in them, so that I can eat those.

I like chocolate chip cookies without chocolate chips. That's weird. That's very strange. Isn't that just a sugar cookie at that point, with a little vanilla? Why does anyone take... No, sugar cookies are like the white. I like the brown. Brown, yeah, the brown sugar. Of all the things you could have said on this show to kill your credibility, why does anyone take your food thoughts seriously? Are you serious?

It's a chocolate chip cookie. Why don't you call it a cookie? Here's the part where he's going to... The chocolate chip cookies, they'll double it up. And like, we have twice the chips. I actually want half, because there's too many. So, I like like three or four maybe per cookie, but no more. This is completely besides the point. Thank you for your horrible thoughts on cookie culture. Your thoughts on cookie culture are disgusting.

So, okay, I had a question I thought would be interesting for you to answer, Erika, here as a little bit of a tease. So, someone said, another great episode of The Deep. Thanks, Erika. I agree that we need better social safety nets through family, community, and church rather than the government. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on what that actually looks like. And ways to cultivate those safety nets. Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, and what I'm talking about with those safety nets later on in the video, and those little small communities, I mean, talking very local, like parish communities, very simple.

Do you know two other moms in the parish who have kids under five years old who aren't in school yet, or you're not homeschooling all day? Like, just get together with them. Say, okay, Tuesday mornings, we're going to like go around different people's houses. You don't even have to like really like. These women, you just get to know them, host them in your house, let your kids play with your kids. I would hope so. Well, no, there's a difference between loving and liking.

You've got to start somewhere. You do, exactly. That's true. Oh, she's just weird. Like, she's going to judge. No, just get together. Like, build these little things. So, church, a great way to do it. Oh, wait, wait. Can you tell? You throw like... I do, yeah. So, the Akron family... Yeah, we do ragers, and actually, for a time, we lived in the same city as the Frads of Matt Frad fame, and he and Cameron, at the time, were doing these things they called like Open Porch Sunday.

So, once a month, they would do it. Then, when we moved away, we were like, that was a great idea. So, we try and do this once a month. We just open up our home, which is not huge. It's not fancy. It's just your average middle-class home in suburban America, but we just open up. We have a very large list now of people from the parish or people from work or people from around the town that we've met, and we just say, it's a potluck.

From 4 to 8 p.m. on Sunday afternoon, the house is yours. Bring your kids. Bring food to share, and it's become like... A great thing. We've been doing it for about three years now. We sort of started it when Connecticut was still having COVID lockdowns, and people just need to get together. And over the years, it's morphed, and yeah, we've met great people.

Okay, so the largest one we had, this was terrible. We had like 160 people show up, but it was bad because it was our Guadalupe party. So, we have a Guadalupe party every December. We turn it into celebration, so it's like Mexican and all this and, you know, Juan Diego. And of the 160, I think like 85 of them were small children, and it's the middle of winter. It was so cold outside. The kids didn't care, so I ended up bringing all my crockpots outside and putting Like, hot chocolate in them, so the kids are, like, freezing outside drinking hot chocolate, and the adults are...

It was great, but it was fun. Dude, is there a day where we could do Erika Potluck Project X with all the Lucas listeners? I think we just need to crash it. Just one day. No, you can. It's open. Yeah, no, actually, we pull up. Can we call it Second Sunday, even though it's never on the second Sunday of the month, never works out that way, but... Yeah, you're all welcome. I think we can pull up.

Okay, sweet. Okay, we've got Twilight Zone now. Okay, so do you remember that old Jaguar ad that the car manufacturer made? Sorry, it is pronounced Jaguar. These new guys don't say it that way. Let me tell you what. They did this ad last year, and we spoofed it on this. Here is the image of these guys. I mean, when you are thinking about the ultra-rich, super-rich people who buy Jaguar, this is not the kind of client. This is not what they are thinking about.

That is not how they see themselves. Well, shocking, I know, given this is their advertising campaign. We're all raggy. Car manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover has said it's going to axe up to 500 management jobs in the UK through a voluntary redundancy program. Voluntary redundancy. Go woke, go broke, guys. What a shocker. Oh.

What corporate jargon is voluntary redundancy? Is it if you think your job isn't important, you can get a package or something? It sounds like the euphemism you use to kill your grandma. You know, like, what? Is Canada doing here? What?

So, there's that. And the second thing is, by the way, we were talking about all this Epstein stuff the last few episodes, and Tom was just outraged because he's Mr. Super. He's Mr. Super online Gen Z. I get it. What did I say? I am not defending all this stuff, but I said, it may be just a very online thing, and it may not totally destroy the entire Republican Party into shreds. Roll the tape.

I mean, look, I think this one surprised me a bit because of all these complaints online going after Trump and the Epstein files. You might think his approval ratings were going down with Republicans. If anything, they're going up. Republicans who approve of Trump, look at our CNN poll. The prior one, 86%. The one out this week, 88% were Republicans. How about Quinnipiac? The prior poll, 87% approved of Republicans. This week out, 90% were Republicans. If anything, Donald Trump's approval rating has gone up.

He is at the apex, or close thereto, in terms of his popularity with Republican voters. Epstein files complaints for you. Now, it keeps going. Hold on. Let's prove that not everything... O-A-O. In real life. Who knew? Who knew?

Amazing. Twitter and X are not reality. Is there any reason that you can find that this hasn't taken hold and hurt him? Yeah. I mean, on X, all you hear about is the Epstein files. But how about out in the real public? Republicans who said the top issue was Epstein case. Thanks. The answer is one. One, and not one percent. One responded. This is a great little finding that Ariel Edwards-Levy, who of course is part of our team, found just one single...

Okay, you're laughing at me. This is stupid. I know, I know, I know. Who would say it's your top? All right. Just because it is not your number one issue, it does not mean you do not care about it. For example, a conservative might say their number one issue is the open border or something like that. It is not that they do not care about Epstein. That part was kind of funny, though. But the fact of the matter is, the polling numbers that he went on to explain over the next 45 seconds or so, we do not have to run it, was that the real problem is Democrats.

They are in the toilet with their polling. The only thing I had said- Is that as much as I'm frustrated by Pam Bondi's promises that were broken and, oh, it's on my desk, all that stuff, I'm not excusing this. I'm not in favor of what they're doing. I'm just saying this idea that it's going to be cataclysmic for Republicans in 18 months, if the Republicans lose the midterms next year, it's not because of this fallout. It'll be because They have a razor-thin majority, and Democrats hate Trump, and they go out and vote for him.

They're Democratic candidates. I just don't think it's going to make that big of an interest, and the polling would suggest that the oracle is right once again. Okay, you can take your little CNN poll, and you can go to the bank with it. I think you're generally right, but I still think that the way they responded to all this was terrible. I mean, I do think they responded terribly. I think he is now.

He's coming around now, and he's like, well, now I'm pressing Pam Bondi to release certain stuff, and it's like, wait, I thought it was a Democrat hoax. It's like, none of the way he's treated this has made any sense. I think this morning, too, they said that he wrote a birthday letter or something. Now they're fighting over that, whether he wrote a birthday letter or not. The Wall Street Journal reported it, but they won't show anyone the letter because they don't have it.

You're like, wait, what? You think it's real? Oh, man, yeah. Nothing is real. Yeah, classic. Then they released the Minnesota shooter letter, too, after not releasing it for a while, and he was also saying that I think Tim Waltz sent him on a hit to take someone out. Oh, Tim. It is hard to track all this stuff, man. We got to limit our scope to understanding certain things very well and bring them to you, but there is a lot floating around that I am just like, I see.

I am like, I am probably living in a simulation, probably. Speaking of living in a simulation. I don't know. Elon has gone off the deep end. The man is not stable. This is not good. So, last week, we had, are there demons in your chat, GPT? And I was talking about and explaining on that deep episode about these AI companions that are being developed, and they are AI agents who are basically like they talk to other AI systems all over the web, so they're more like this network of...

Agent. Well, I'll just keep saying agents. And the network, then you can decide how you want them to speak to you and appear to you and all that. And Sam Altman is all excited because he's going to have this little device that lives on a pendant so girls can accessorize with them.

Dude, talk about people I don't trust, Sam Altman. He's so scary. He's so creepy. Very frightening. His interview with Ross Douthat was terrifying. But anyway. Going back to this. So, anyway, you have this little device, and you're going to have an AI companion that's tailored to your needs, and Elon's like, oh, boy, I'm going to get out in front of this, and I'm going to introduce Grok Companions.

I don't even want to show this on the screen. It creeps me out so much, but go ahead. Do I have to? Come on, man. This is what Elon came up with. Listen, Erika's making you do this. And this is what he came up with.

And don't scroll down, because the bottom half of her outfit is absolutely pornographic. I watched the whole first thing, and he had her explaining, her being this weird anime sex object, is explaining quantum mechanics in this hyper-sexualized language, and you're like, this is so creep and so disgusting, but it gives me an opportunity to tell you the difference between two dystopian novels that everyone's been talking about since Joe Biden died on stage.

We have 1984, right? 1984 by George Orwell, and then we have Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and people are like, they're always citing 1984. They're like, 1984, Big Brother, and yeah, I felt like I was living in 1984, where this whole, like, this overlord beats you with a stick and forces you to do all these things, and Elon Musk himself.

I was constantly tweeting images from the movie 1984, quotes from George Orwell as he was going through the campaign, being like, we have to fight Big Brother. This is 1984. We are living in it. And I was like, yep, probably right. However, Elon... ...is actually creating the brave new world here, in which the impetus for the one-world domination was not this, like, we're beating over the head, and we're infiltrating you, and we're making you suffer, but it was Soma, the drug, the drink, that people took, and it was so pleasurable, and it made life so bearable, that they chose, basically, like, pornified brain over freedom.

And that's exactly what The Grok Companion is. Okay, so wait a minute now. I've never read Brave New World. I think you've convinced me that the dystopia that we have to worry about, Brave New World, is more of a danger than 1984. I think you've gotten me convinced on that. But what if the real dystopia we have to worry about is idiocracy?

Well, yeah, whenever they're like, oh my gosh, Elon's such an oligarch, I'm like, no, he's an idiocrat. Elon is more interesting to me than that. I actually do think I have a lot of respect for him because In a world where, if you go on the Forbes richest people list of the last year, how they made all their money, it's all like finance people. It's all like people, Bill Ackman, like short stocking, whatever. They're just playing financial tricks to make a ton of money, and they don't really contribute a lot, in my opinion, to society.

Elon, if you step into Tesla, it's like walking into an iPhone for the first time. It's really unbelievable. He's made rockets more successful than NASA. NASA can't even get our people up. So, he's clearly capable of producing It's really interesting, innovative, challenging. I don't dispute that he's a genius, but the problem is those people often struggle with understanding humans. Yeah. So, it's like that's where you need to moderate him with a guy who's just a bro and has a couple kids with his own life.

What are we doing here? You know what I mean? What are we doing here? The plants don't need electrolytes after all. Combine it with someone who's... Yeah, turns out. Yeah. Also... So, I'm just going to drop this bomb and leave it at that. So, interesting developments. Advertisers on Facebook and Instagram.

Twitter, all across the board, there's been a lot less traffic delivered to these advertisers, like significant amount, over 10%. And they're saying because algorithmic feeds have taken over just about everywhere, there's less. People have retreated on the internet from places that they used to be because they're so inundated with ads. And a place that they used to go before, where it's like, oh, I get shown a couple things from my friends in my feed, that just doesn't happen anymore. And there's a huge uptick in bot activity on these places.

So, it's like you're not even sure if the traffic is legitimate or not. It could just come from a bot somewhere around the country. So, you're saying they're seeing a reduction in traffic to Facebook and Instagram and Twitter?

Social media platforms largely, which is just a huge alarm bell for a lot of companies that advertise there, but it suggests to me that there's something called dead internet that they're now bringing up where people are retreating from those places, and they're actually hanging out more in places like Telegram or Facebook Messenger or places where there can't be advertisements or stuff put in front of them, and they're trying to find ways to now monetize. Yeah, brands are trying to find ways to get into those spaces because that is where people are.

So, there could be a scenario where the internet, as we understand it now, even for the example of the AI bot, the AI bot goes to places you would have gone before, finds information tailored to you, and brings it back to you, so you are actually not even really ever on the site. So, it is really changing internet traction and how people capture attention, and that has consequences not just for advertisers, but for politicians. For anyone that's trying to get people's attention is really rapidly changing fast, like really fast.

I'm seeing a lot of that right now. So, I don't know where all this is going. Probably Brave New World, as Erika said, but yeah, very interesting developments on all those fronts. I have one final thing. It's Shane Gillis at the Epsomese. So, okay, full story of the Shane Gillis at the Epsomese. I had so many people send it to me, like the morning after, different clips from it, that I had to go find the full thing. And it was actually really hard to find the full thing, I imagine because ABC is a little bit embarrassed.

And it was funny, it was hysterical. It was actually funny. And to the ESPYs credit, I never watched or cared about the ESPYs before Shane Gillis did a monologue on it, so now they're bringing it to me. I had to look up what it was. But I'm just going to play this. Exactly. I'm going to play this. This is one of the funniest jokes I've seen made at a word show, maybe ever.

NBA All-Star Brittany Hicks is here. Give it up for Brittany, everybody. I'm joking around. That's my friend's wife. I knew none of you knew you were NBA players. That's crazy. So, this is his podcast co-host. They have a podcast called Matt and Shane's Secret Podcast, and this is his wife, who is African-American, and they make jokes about it all the time, and she looks like Kareem Jean-Pierre, funny enough, and they were in on this. The camera guy was in on this.

They sent it there, and everyone started clapping. Oh, my gosh. If you watch the full thing, you could just tell they were not prepared. They didn't know who Shane Gillis was. They didn't know he was going to do this, and they were all scared about laughing because they didn't want a camera on them to hear them laughing at stuff that was even just mildly transgressive, and I love this for so many reasons because these award shows are so stupid, and they're so dumb.

They all get in the same room. They all pat each other on the back. They're all like, we're so great. Pat, pat, pat. Awesome. Yeah, and then they bring up a comedian, quote-unquote, to not be funny, and just to, like, their jokes are actually like, oh, it just makes them look even better. Instead of actually making jokes about, it's like, uh, uh, I, uh, Court Jester came back. Like, Shane Gillis making fun of the fact that Bill Belichick's dating a 24-year-old in, like, his 70s.

How has no one made jokes about this in a public forum? Like, everyone's thinking it. Right. There's so many things that just, like, everyone's thinking he finally said, and man, I mean. It was an uncomfortable watch for the audience, but everyone else was like, this is hysterical. It was the best hosting of an event since, you know, Ricky Gervais back in the 20s with the Golden Globes. Beautiful.

Barbecued people. I'll just, every once in a while, I'll just go online and listen to that again every few months. It's so good. It just literally toasts the whole audience. And that's what comedy should be. We've all just accepted sort of a weird lower form of comedy. And, yeah, Shane.

Didn't hold back, so I'm happy to have it back. So, before we get out of here, I think Erika and Josh, you guys are free to hop. I'm going to now show that interview I did with Dr. Francis, and don't worry, I'll be back to pray with you guys after. So, here's the Dr. Francis interview. Grateful to her for taking the time.

Okay, today I'm joined by Dr. Christina Francis. She is an OBGYN who currently works in Fort Wayne, Indiana. She's a member of the Indiana Right to Life. She's a board member. She's part of APLOG, and she's here to talk to us specifically about movement. CatholicVote has been involved in, and from a medical perspective, what's going on with chemical abortion, Mifepristone, and currently the Trump administration. So, Dr. Francis, thank you so much for taking the time. Thanks so much for having me on.

It's great to be here. Yeah, and I especially appreciate that you have real on-the-ground experience with patients, and Mifepristone gets tossed around. I know that there was some movement with Planned Parenthood being banned from the Big Beautiful Bill from getting some funding. So, I guess just to set the stage, why is it so important for you as a medical professional working with patients on the ground to see changes when it comes to safety regulations and Mifepristone chemical abortion in general? Yeah, absolutely.

Well, so, as you said, I'm a board-certified OB-GYN, and I do practice here in Indiana, and I work as an OB hospitalist, which means that I don't see patients in the office anymore, but I purely work in the hospital. So, a lot of what I do is delivering babies and managing high-risk pregnancies, but the other part of my job is that I'm the one that gets called down to the emergency room when women come in with OB or GYN-related emergencies.

And even here in Indiana, where we have a very strong pro-life law that restricts almost all abortions, we've gotten rid of about 97% of abortions in the state of Indiana, even with that, because of the deregulation of the abortion pill Mifepristone by the FDA under first the Obama administration and then the Biden administration, we are still seeing regular complications related to women taking these drugs in our emergency rooms here in Indiana. So, you know, just my group alone, and certainly we're not even the only group of OBGYNs here in Fort Wayne, we are seeing on nearly every shift, we will see a woman come in with some kind of complication related to mifepristone, and these are often very serious complications, complications like infections, life-threatening infections.

In fact, I took care of a woman recently with one such infection that required multiple days of IV antibiotics. Retained tissue, where they do not completely pass all of the baby or all of the placenta, and so they have retained tissue that requires potentially an emergency surgery, heavy bleeding, requiring blood transfusions, things like that, that we are seeing on a really routine basis, and so that is part of why we are calling for more regulations to be put into place, because we would not allow this kind of complication rate to continue.

Any other drug, if it had nothing to do with abortion, but it's simply because this is the abortion pill that the FDA in the past has said, you know, it's fine for it to be so unregulated, and why the abortion industry and its allies, unfortunately, even within the medical community, continue to push for the deregulation of this dangerous drug.

Yeah, and as a doctor, I think at the heart of it, we would want proper care for women. Women's safety is tantamount, and I think right now, chemical abortion still makes up the largest percentage of abortion in the country, so clearly it's happening, and people are doing it. I think what is confusing to some people is the language saying coming from Planned Parenthood is, hey, this is just as safe as Tylenol. This is just as safe as something you can get.

I mean, clearly, your experience on the ground is not matching this. And if you could explain, I believe the letter that was sent was to get safety regulations back to a 2000 level. What has happened since 2000, and if someone were to go through the process, unfortunately, of using Mifepristone, what is in place today? Yeah, absolutely. Well, I'll try and do a really, there's really a long kind of sorted history related to this drug, but I'll try to recap it very quickly.

As you said, you know, of course, those of us who are pro-life are opposed to abortion because it ends the life of an innocent child, but also, we care about our maternal patient as well, and we want her to be taken care of, and women are being placed in extreme danger right now, as you said, because they're being sold this lie that this high-risk drug ...is just as safe as Tylenol or other over-the-counter medications, when that simply is not true. So, when this drug was originally approved in 2000, it was done through a rapid approval process under the Clinton administration to fulfill a campaign promise that he had made.

And this process is typically reserved for life-saving drugs that are treating life-threatening conditions. So, in order to approve mifepristone through this process, the FDA had to label pregnancy ... As a life-threatening disease, that's problem number one. Pregnancy is not, in general, a life-threatening disease, even though there can be complications. So, it was approved through this rapid process, and partly because of that, the FDA recognized that this drug had significant potential serious complications. And so, because of that, they put in place several safeguards around this drug, saying it could only be given through seven weeks of pregnancy.

Women had to have three in-person visits to... To get the drug, one, before they were given the drug, and two, follow-up visits to screen for complications and ensure that their abortion was complete. All adverse events had to be reported to the FDA, and only physicians could dispense this drug, and it had to be given in a healthcare facility. These eventually became known as something called the REMS program, which are applied to potentially very dangerous drugs to try to minimize their risk of side effects.

And during the next several years, a black... box warning was also applied to Mifepristone because of the severe risk of infection and hemorrhage or heavy bleeding. Those remained in place until 2016. In 2016, again, under the Obama administration, several changes were made. One, they expanded the use of the drug up to 10 weeks of pregnancy. They also said those two follow-up visits, you don't need those anymore. Women only have to come for one visit before they get the drug. And at the same time, knowing that those two things in particular were going to increase the risk of complications significantly, they then said you no longer have to report any complication other than death if a woman dies.

And then in 2021, under the Biden administration, they said, well, look, we made all these changes in 2016, and there was no significant increase in complications. Remember, they weren't requiring reporting of that anymore. And they used that as an excuse to remove that final in-person visit. And when they did that, that meant that now these drugs can be dispensed online. Many people say they're dispensed via telehealth. Really, I think that's even misleading. When people hear telehealth, they think a woman's sitting down.

conversing with a physician like me. That's simply not the case. There are over 70 websites where women can go to the website, fill out a form with no screening for how far along they are, no ruling out of ectopic pregnancy, which is the leading cause of maternal mortality in the first trimester and is very common and can kill women if it's not treated. And it's not treated by Mifepristone. And no screening for coercion either. And we're seeing the real life. of this, not only in my emergency room when I'm seeing complications, but there is a story out of Louisiana where a teen girl found herself pregnant, was actually excited after getting over, I'm sure, the shock of finding out she was pregnant, wanted to continue her pregnancy.

Her mom didn't want her to, so her mom got online, ordered these drugs from a doctor in New York, and forced them on her teenage daughter, who then suffered such a severe complication she had to be taken to the emergency room. We have boyfriends who are forcing abortions on their girlfriends, unwanted abortions on their girlfriends. So, we are seeing the real-life fallout of this deregulation of this very high-risk drug. And so, as you said, APLOG, the American Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs, which I am honored to lead, we led a letter.

We are joined by five other medical organizations representing 30,000 medical professionals across the country. We led a letter to HHS and the FDA. Asking, urging them to reinstate those original safeguards from 2000 so that women will be protected, and also urging them to add an ultrasound requirement. Ultrasound is extremely important for fully informed consent, so we know how far along a woman is in her pregnancy, we know she doesn't have an ectopic pregnancy, and so that she understands what's truly going on inside of her.

So, we're really hopeful that The FDA, Dr. Marty McCary, who's there, and Secretary Kennedy at HHS will be open to looking at the dangers of this drug. What precipitated this letter was not only what we're seeing in our clinical practices, but also there is new data that came out from the Ethics and Public Policy Center, as well as an organization called FFROA that looked at over 860,000 chemical abortions in the United States. from across the country using insurance claims data, and what they found was perfectly consistent with what we are seeing in our clinical practice.

They found that nearly one in nine women who take these drugs will suffer a serious complication related to the drug itself. One in nine. That is way higher than the complication rate related to taking Tylenol, and the other thing that I always like to point out about that comparison between mifepristone and Tylenol is that the complications we see related to Tylenol are related to overdoses of Tylenol. The complications that we're seeing related to mifepristone are due to taking the FDA-approved dose of mifepristone.

So, these are highly dangerous drugs, and women deserve to have all of that information before they make a choice about whether or not to take them. Yeah, absolutely. Dr. Francis, if people want to be able to get involved and support and actually make more noise about this getting into place, how can they help? Yeah, I think there's several different ways that people can help. First of all, I would just be, they can follow AppLog on social media. They could follow, as you said, I know CatholicVote is doing a lot related to chemical abortion, so follow us on social media and re-share our posts about the dangers of this drug.

I think, first and foremost, we need women who are considering abortion to understand the dangers of this drug for them and for their unborn child. Second, you can contact your member of Congress and ask them to contact HHS and FDA, and ask them to reinstate these safeguards. And third, I would go online and contact HHS and FDA and say, as a concerned citizen, you are worried about the dangers that this drug is posing to women and girls across the country, and that you would urge them to, again, take another look into the safety of this drug.

Ultimately, you know, I think the safety needs to be fully reviewed, and this drug should be pulled from the market because of how dangerous it is to women. But at the very least, we're asking... that these original safeguards be put back into place. So, there's a number of different ways that you can do that, and I would encourage people to be involved in this process. The FDA needs to hear from you as a concerned citizen. You know, their job that they were tasked with by Congress was to ensure that any drug that's on the market is safe for people to take and is being dispensed in the safest way, and that's simply not the case with the abortion drug.

All right, gang. Thanks for joining today's episode. Covered a ton of ground. I'm here to do the closing prayer, but before, if you consider joining the Champions Club, it's the best way to support us, CatholicVote.org. If you want to support the show, leave a review. Apple Podcasts and Spotify helps us out a ton. You can email me, LOOPcast at CatholicVote.org. But above all, pray for us, pray for the repos of the souls of those who have died in Gaza and that church, for that church community, for an end to the war, for peace in the world, and for the LOOPcast.

So, we pray our closing prayer today in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. Blessed Apostles, St. Paul, greatest of all converts who labored unceasingly for the conversion of other souls, inspire me with the ardor of your zeal that I may pray and work for the conversion of my brethren, redeemed in the blood of Christ, but not as yet blessed with the full light of his truth, mindful of the loving concern of the divine shepherd for the salvation of the other sheep that are not of this fold.

I now beg your intercession. To obtain the grace of conversion for, you can fill that one in, in the name of a family member, friend, or others, may God, the Holy Spirit, from whom alone this gift can come, hear my humble prayer, and thus enable me to share with others the riches of my heritage of faith through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. Thank you guys for joining. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. Great show. We'll catch you guys on Monday. Go check out Erika's episode of The Deep if you want more, and have a great weekend. We'll see you then. Peace.