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<title>Trump’s Big, Beautiful Load of B.S.</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/trumps-big-beautiful-load-of-b-s/</link>
<comments>https://themoderatevoice.com/trumps-big-beautiful-load-of-b-s/#respond</comments>
<dc:creator><![CDATA[ROBERT A. LEVINE, TMV Columnist]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Mon, 07 Jul 2025 13:56:13 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[demagoguery]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Beautiful Bill]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Big]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[billionaire]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Medicaid]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[National Debt]]></category>
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<category><![CDATA[Taxes]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[trump]]></category>
<guid isPermaLink="false">https://themoderatevoice.com/?p=286336</guid>
<description><![CDATA[What Trump has been trumpeting as a “Big, Beautiful, Bill” is really a load of B.S. While it is beneficial for his billionaire buddies, it is not good for America, especially the lower middle class and poor Americans. It is also bad for the future of the nation, saddling coming generations with a mountain of<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/trumps-big-beautiful-load-of-b-s/"> […]</a>
The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/trumps-big-beautiful-load-of-b-s/">Trump’s Big, Beautiful Load of B.S.</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com">The Moderate Voice</a>.
]]></description>
<content:encoded><![CDATA[<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/cccc-1-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-286229" />What Trump has been trumpeting as a “Big, Beautiful, Bill” is really a load of B.S. While it is beneficial for his billionaire buddies, it is not good for America, especially the lower middle class and poor Americans. It is also bad for the future of the nation, saddling coming generations with a mountain of debt. Trump has a glib tongue and is a master of deception, and he has conned his base and the Republican Party into believing the bill will be good for them, when the opposite is true.
The current U.S. national debt is $36.2 trillion, the highest level ever. Our GDP (gross domestic product) is about $29 trillion. Thus, our debt to GDP ratio is about 123 percent. Our nation has a higher debt level than the amount of goods it produces in a year. This places us in a very precarious financial situation. Though about 70 percent of the national debt is held by domestic institutions and citizens, 30 percent is owned by foreign entities, the largest being Japan and China. If China decided to dump all of its holdings of American debt suddenly, this could cause problems for the American financial system, though the difficulty would likely be only temporary.
However, a reasonable debt to GDP ratio is probably in the realm of 70 percent or less instead of 123 percent. We should be trying to lower the national debt, but Trump’s big beautiful bill will raise the debt by another $4 trillion according to the Congressional budget office. The easiest way to lower debt would be to increase taxes on our wealthiest citizens. Certainly, billionaires and multi-millionaires could afford to pay considerably more in taxes without a change in their lifestyle. But these are Trump’s biggest supporters and contributed money to his campaign, he does not want to have them pay more in taxes though our country needs the funds. In fact, Trump cut personnel in the Internal Revenue Service so that audits of individual tax returns of the wealthy segment of the population would be decreased. The IRS needs more personnel, not less.
Even though the increase in our national debt was a terrible move by Trump and his Republican allies in Congress, even worse is the cutting of Medicaid and the SNAP programs. This shows an unprecedented level of disregard and cruelty to a segment of our citizens. Trump did not care that most of those affected by slashing these programs were from his base, though that should not have made any difference. Those who will suffer most are impoverished and lower middle-class citizens. SNAP provides school lunches for children who can’t afford them and families who may now go hungry.
Medicaid is the health care program for impoverished and lower middle-class families who have no health insurance. Citizens in rural counties and inner cities will be most affected. Because of the Medicaid cuts, many rural hospitals may be forced to close as there will be no funding for the care of many of their patients. This will leave these counties as health deserts, with no medical care available for many citizens over vast distances. Raising taxes on the wealthy could have also kept SNAP and Medicaid intact, but neither Trump nor Congressional Republicans cared. It is unconscionable that America appears to care more about taxes on the wealthy than food and health care for the poor.
www.robertlevineooks.com
Buy The Uninformed Voter on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and at your local bookstore.
Posted at 09:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: Beautiful Bill, Big, Medicaid, national debt, SNAP, taxes, Trump
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<title>What MAGA means to Americans</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/what-maga-means-to-americans/</link>
<comments>https://themoderatevoice.com/what-maga-means-to-americans/#respond</comments>
<dc:creator><![CDATA[Guest Voice]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 04 Jul 2025 03:49:45 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Extremists]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[ai]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[America First]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[artificial intelligence]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Artificial intelligence (AI) Democracy Republicans Democrats Democratic Party Republican Party Donald Trump America First Make America Great Again MAGA LGBTQI+ MAGA Republicans ChatGP]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[ChatGPT]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
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<category><![CDATA[MAGA]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[MAGA Republicans]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Make America Great Again]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Republican Party]]></category>
<guid isPermaLink="false">https://themoderatevoice.com/?p=286331</guid>
<description><![CDATA[A Trump supporter holds up a MAGA sign during a rally in Green Bay, Wis., on April 2, 2024. AP Photo/Mike Roemer Jesse Rhodes, UMass Amherst; Adam Eichen, UMass Amherst; Douglas Rice, UMass Amherst; Gregory Wall, UMass Amherst, and Tatishe Nteta, UMass Amherst A decade ago, Donald Trump descended the golden escalator at Trump Tower<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/what-maga-means-to-americans/"> […]</a>
The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/what-maga-means-to-americans/">What MAGA means to Americans</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com">The Moderate Voice</a>.
]]></description>
<content:encoded><![CDATA[ <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677627/original/file-20250701-62-uwpu8c.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C144%2C8192%2C4608&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" /><figcaption>
A Trump supporter holds up a MAGA sign during a rally in Green Bay, Wis., on April 2, 2024. 
<a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/MLKDayTrumpInauguration/a6426fa354864776a1b65df59a3353ea/photo?Query=Trump%20Maga&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=161&currentItemNo=25">AP Photo/Mike Roemer</a> 
</figcaption><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jesse-rhodes-141349">Jesse Rhodes</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/adam-eichen-1517994">Adam Eichen</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/douglas-rice-1524410">Douglas Rice</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gregory-wall-2421760">Gregory Wall</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/tatishe-nteta-1515087">Tatishe Nteta</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>
A decade ago, <a href="https://www.c-span.org/clip/campaign-2016/trump-coming-down-escalator/4583025">Donald Trump descended the golden escalator at Trump Tower</a> in New York City and ignited a political movement that has <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/16/politics/trump-golden-escalator-10-years-later-analysis">reshaped American politics</a>. In a memorable turn of phrase, Trump promised supporters of his 2016 presidential campaign that “we are going to make our country great again.”
Since then, the Make America Great Again movement has dominated the U.S. political conversation, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/polling-shows-growing-number-republicans-identify-maga-movement-rcna201071">reshaped the Republican Party</a> and <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/big-business-maga-merch-2008135">become a lucrative brand</a> adorning hats, T-shirts and bumper stickers. 
When asked what MAGA means to him, Trump, in a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-came-up-with-make-america-great-again/2017/01/17/fb6acf5e-dbf7-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html">2017 interview with The Washington Post</a> said, “To me, it meant jobs. It meant industry, and meant military strength. It meant taking care of our veterans. It meant so much.”
But Democratic leaders have a different interpretation of the slogan. 
<a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bill-clinton-make-america-great-again_n_57d06ccfe4b0a48094a749fc">Former President Bill Clinton in 2016</a> said of MAGA: “That message where ‘I’ll give you America great again’ is if you’re a white Southerner, you know exactly what it means, don’t you? What it means is ‘I’ll give you an economy you had 50 years ago, and I’ll move you back up on the social totem pole and other people down.”
While MAGA is ubiquitous, little is known about what it means to the American public. Ten years on, what do Americans think when they hear or read this phrase?
Based on the analysis of Americans’ explanations of what “Make America Great Again” means to them, we found evidence suggesting that the public’s views of MAGA mirror the perspectives offered by both Trump and Clinton.
Republicans interpret this phrase as a call for the renewal of the U.S. economy and military might, as well as a return to “traditional” values, especially those relating to gender roles and gender identities. Democrats, we found, view MAGA as a call for a return to white supremacy and growing authoritarianism.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man descends an escalator as other people watch." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677628/original/file-20250701-68-o0snh8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Donald Trump rides an escalator to a press event to announce his candidacy for the U.S. presidency at Trump Tower on June 16, 2015, in New York City. 
<a class="source" href="http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/business-mogul-donald-trump-rides-an-escalator-to-a-press-news-photo/477321340?adppopup=true">Christopher Gregory/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>What MAGA means</h2>
We are <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=OfgJBywAAAAJ">political scientists</a> who use <a href="https://www.umass.edu/political-science/about/directory/gregory-wall">public opinion polls</a> to <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=iInqk6YAAAAJ">study the role</a> of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=OsXHylAAAAAJ">partisanship</a> in <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=T-_CX5kAAAAJ">American politics</a>. To better understand American views about MAGA, in April 2025 we asked 1,000 respondents in a <a href="https://www.umass.edu/political-science/umass-amherst-poll">nationally representative online survey</a> to briefly write what “Make America Great Again” meant to them.
The survey question was open-ended, allowing respondents to define this phrase in any way they saw fit. We used AI-based thematic analysis and qualitative reading of the responses to better understand how Democrats and Republicans define the slogan.
For our AI-based thematic analysis, we instructed ChatGPT to provide three overarching themes most touched upon by Democratic and Republican respondents. This approach follows recent research demonstrating that, when properly instructed, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1162/tacl_a_00632">ChatGPT reliably identifies broad themes</a> in collections of texts.
<iframe id="DrlWB" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/DrlWB/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: 0;" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe>
<h2>Republican interpretation of MAGA</h2>
Our analysis shows that Republicans view the slogan as representing the “American dream.” In part, MAGA is about restoring the nation’s pride and economic strength. Reflecting these themes, one Republican respondent wrote that MAGA means “encouraging manufacturers to hire Americans and strengthen the economy. Making the USA self-sufficient as it once was.” 
MAGA is also closely related among Republicans with an “<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/2025/01/president-trumps-america-first-priorities/">America First</a>” policy. This is partly about having a strong military – a common theme among Republican respondents – and “making America the superpower” again, one respondent wrote.
Republicans also wrote that putting America first means emphasizing strict enforcement of immigration laws against “illegals” and cutting off foreign aid. For example, one Republican respondent said that MAGA meant “stopping illegals at the border, ending freebies for illegals, adding more police and building a strong military.” 
Finally, Republicans see the slogan as calling for a return to “traditional” values. They expressed a strong desire to reverse cultural shifts that Republican respondents perceive as a threat. 
As one Republican put it, MAGA “means going back to where men would join the military, women were home raising healthy minded children and it was easy to be successful, the crime rate was extremely low and it used to be safe for kids to hang out on the streets with other kids and even walk themselves places.” 
Another Republican made the connection between MAGA and traditional gender roles even more explicit, highlighting the link between MAGA and opposition to transgender rights: “MAGA people know there are only 2 sexes and a man can never be a woman. If you believe otherwise you are destroying AMERICA.”
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A large banner of a man is seen through tree leaves in the foreground." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677629/original/file-20250701-56-2t8m34.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
A banner showing a picture of President Donald Trump is displayed outside of the U.S. Department of Agriculture building on June 3, 2025, in Washington, D.C. 
<a class="source" href="http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/banner-showing-a-picture-of-u-s-president-donald-trump-is-news-photo/2218066739?adppopup=true">Kevin Carter/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>Democratic MAGA views</h2>
Democrats have a very different understanding of the MAGA slogan. Many Democrats view MAGA as a white supremacist movement designed to protect the status of white people and undermine the civil rights of marginalized groups.
One Democrat argued that “‘Make America Great Again’ is a standard borne by people who’ve seen a decrease in the potency of their privilege (see: cisgendered white men) and wish to see their privilege restored or strengthened. In essence, it’s a chant for all racist, fascist and otherwise bigoted actors to unite under.” 
Another Democrat wrote that MAGA was a call to “take us backwards as a society in regards to women’s, minority’s, and LGBTQ people’s rights … It would take us to a time when only White men ruled.”
Democrats also view MAGA as a form of nostalgia for a heavily mythologized past. Many Democratic respondents described the past longed for by Republicans as a “myth” or “fairytale.” Others argued that this mythologized past, though appealing on the surface, was repressive for many Americans. 
One Democrat said that MAGA meant “returning America to a fantasy version of the past with the goal of advancing the success of white, straight, wealthy men by any means necessary and almost always to the detriment of other segments of the population.”
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man dressed in a white hat and tshirt holds a sign that reads 'Trump won't erase us.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/677632/original/file-20250701-56-x7y30j.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
A person holds a ‘Trump won’t erase us’ sign while walking in the WorldPride Parade on June 7, 2025, in Washington, D.C. 
<a class="source" href="http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/person-holds-a-trump-wont-erase-us-sign-while-walking-in-news-photo/2218511758?adppopup=true">Kevin Carter/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
Finally, many Democrats interpret the slogan as reflecting an authoritarian cult of personality. In this vein, a Democratic respondent said of MAGA, “It’s a call to arms for MAGA cult members, who believe that Trump and the Republicans party will somehow improve their lives by targeting people and policies they don’t like, even when it is against their best interests and any rational thought process.”
While some Republicans expressed racist, xenophobic or anti-trans sentiments in their understanding of MAGA, some Democrats revealed outright condescension toward MAGA believers. 
“The MAGA’s are brainwashed, idiotic members of society who know nothing more than to follow the lead of an idiotic president who has the vocabulary of a 3rd grader,” one Democrat wrote. “It is nonsense idiots parrot,” another respondent said.
In all, in the 10 years since Donald Trump burst onto the political scene, <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/P/bo215473269.html">much has been written</a> about the conflicting visions of past, present and future at the heart of America’s partisan divisions. 
With the Trump administration’s proclaimed commitment to return the U.S. to its “<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/remarks/2025/01/the-inaugural-address/">golden age</a>” and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/opinion/trump-has-reawakened-the-resistance.html">a strong resistance to his efforts</a>, only time will tell which vision of America will prevail.<img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/259241/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" />
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jesse-rhodes-141349">Jesse Rhodes</a>, Associate Professor of Political Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/adam-eichen-1517994">Adam Eichen</a>, PhD Candidate, Political Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/douglas-rice-1524410">Douglas Rice</a>, Associate Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gregory-wall-2421760">Gregory Wall</a>, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/tatishe-nteta-1515087">Tatishe Nteta</a>, Provost Professor of Political Science and Director of the UMass Amherst Poll, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/umass-amherst-1563">UMass Amherst</a>
This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-maga-means-to-americans-259241">original article</a>.
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<title>One ‘big, beautiful’ reason why Republicans in Congress just can’t quit Donald Trump</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/one-big-beautiful-reason-why-republicans-in-congress-just-cant-quit-donald-trump/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Guest Voice]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 04 Jul 2025 03:44:06 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[The U.S. Capitol is seen shortly after the Senate passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 1, 2025. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Charlie Hunt, Boise State University As the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic tax and spending package, many critics are wondering how the<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/one-big-beautiful-reason-why-republicans-in-congress-just-cant-quit-donald-trump/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[ <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/678208/original/file-20250703-56-lblxhq.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C98%2C7600%2C4275&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" /><figcaption>
The U.S. Capitol is seen shortly after the Senate passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 1, 2025. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/storm-clouds-hover-over-the-u-s-capitol-shortly-after-the-news-photo/2223109696?adppopup=true">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images </a> 
</figcaption><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/charlie-hunt-1364391">Charlie Hunt</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/boise-state-university-1983">Boise State University</a>
As the U.S. House of Representatives <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/live-blog/trump-big-beautiful-bill-house-taxes-immigration-live-updates-rcna215840">voted to approve</a> President Donald Trump’s sweeping <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1/text">domestic tax and spending package</a>, many critics are wondering how the president retained the loyalty of so many congressional Republicans, with so few defections.
Just three Republican senators – the maximum allowed for <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1">the One Big Beautiful Bill Act</a> to still pass – voted against the Senate version of the bill <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/senate-final-vote-trump-big-beautiful-bill-republicans-rcna216096">on July 1</a>, 2025. In the House, only two Republicans voted against the bill, which <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/07/03/us/trump-news-policy-bill">passed the chamber</a> on July 3.
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/06/30/upshot/senate-republican-megabill.html">Among other things</a>, the bill will slash taxes by about <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-big-beautiful-bill-senate-tax-medicaid-cuts-rcna216024">US$4.5 trillion</a> over a decade and <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/heres-whats-in-the-big-bill-that-just-passed-the-senate">exempt people’s tips and overtime pay</a> from federal income taxes.
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CRgK0ov7eAA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
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But the bill has been widely panned, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/big-beautiful-bill-trump-tax-cuts-3b525482be43fdf956366cebd84dcaac">including by some</a> <a href="https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/07/01/congress/lisa-murkowski-repulican-megabill-alaska-00435150">Republicans</a>. 
Democrats have <a href="https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1191/vote_119_1_00372.htm">uniformly opposed it</a>, in part thanks to the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/07/02/nx-s1-5453870/senate-republicans-tax-bill-medicaid-health-care">bill’s sweeping cuts to Medicaid</a> and Affordable Care Act marketplace funding. This could lead to an estimated <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61534">12 million more people</a> without insurance by 2034.
The legislation is also likely to <a href="https://www.crfb.org/blogs/cbo-estimates-3-trillion-debt-house-passed-obbba#:%7E:text=Based%20on%20CBO's%20estimate%2C%20the,temporary%20provisions%20are%20made%20permanent.">add between $3 trilion</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/06/29/us/trump-news#senate-bill-trump-cbo-score-debt">and $5 trillion</a> to the national debt by 2034, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
<h2>The power of the presidency</h2>
Trump is not the first president to bend Congress to his will to get legislation approved. 
Presidential supremacy over the legislative process <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12068">has been on the rise</a> for decades. But contrary to popular belief, lawmakers are not always simply voting based on blind partisanship. 
Increasingly, politicians in the same political party as a president are voting in line with the president because their political futures are as tied up with the president’s reputation <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2021.102387">as they have ever been</a>.
Even when national polling indicates a policy is unpopular – as is the case <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/polls-show-americans-largely-oppose-trumps-big-beautiful/story?id=123343071">with Trump’s budget reconciliation bill</a>, which an estimated 55% of American voters said in June they oppose, according to <a href="https://poll.qu.edu/poll-release?releaseid=3926">Quinnipiac University polling</a> – lawmakers in the president’s party have serious motivation to follow the president’s lead.
Or else they risk losing reelection.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A white man with glasses, dark hair and a dark suit with a white shirt and red tie smiles and appears to speak into a microphone as people surround him." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/678209/original/file-20250703-56-q6etjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson speaks to reporters at the Capitol building on July 3, 2025. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/speaker-of-the-house-rep-mike-johnson-speaks-to-reporters-news-photo/2223413347?adppopup=true">Alex Wong/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>Lawmakers increasingly partisan on presidential policy</h2>
Over the past 50 years, lawmakers in the president’s party have increasingly supported the president’s position on legislation that passes Congress. Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, are increasingly united against the president’s position.
In 1970, for example, when Republican President Richard Nixon was in the White House, Republicans in <a href="https://www.congress.gov/congressional-record/91st-congress/browse-by-date">Congress voted along</a> with his <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/vital-statistics-on-congress/">positions 72% of the time</a>. But the Democratic majority in Congress voted with him nearly as much, at <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/vital-statistics-on-congress/">60% of the time</a>, particularly on Nixon’s more <a href="https://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/magazine/richard-nixon-and-the-rise-of-american-environmentalism/">progressive environmental agenda</a>.
These patterns are unheard of in the modern Congress. In 2022, for example – a year of significant legislative achievement for the Biden administration – the Democratic majority in <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/vital-statistics-on-congress/">Congress voted the same way</a> as the Democratic president 99% of the time. Republicans, meanwhile, <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/vital-statistics-on-congress/">voted with Biden</a> just 19% of the time.
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<h2>Elections can tell us why</h2>
Over the past half-century, the two major parties have changed dramatically, both in the absolutist nature of their beliefs and in relation to one another. 
Both parties used to be more <a href="https://voteview.com/parties/all">mixed in their ideological outlooks</a>, for example, with conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans playing key roles in policymaking. This made it easier to form <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/07343460309507855">cross-party coalitions</a>, either with or against the president. 
A few decades ago, Democrats and Republicans were also less geographically polarized from each other. Democrats were regularly elected to congressional seats in the South, for example, even if those districts supported Republican presidents such as Nixon or Ronald Reagan.
Much of this has changed in recent decades. 
Congress members are not just ideologically at odds with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511790652">colleagues in the other party</a> – they are more <a href="https://rollcall.com/2025/02/18/congress-party-unity-vote-studies/">similar than ever to other members within their party</a>. 
Districts supporting the two parties are also increasingly geographically distant from each other, often along an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716217712696">urban-rural divide</a>. 
And presidents in particular have become <a href="https://theconversation.com/bidens-dragging-poll-numbers-wont-matter-in-2024-if-enough-voters-loathe-his-opponent-even-more-204608">polarizing partisan figures</a> on the national stage.
These changes have ushered in a larger phenomenon called <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/11/01/1132933077/voters-everywhere-are-talking-about-the-same-issues-heres-why-that-matters">political nationalization</a>, in which local political considerations, issues and candidate qualifications have taken a back seat to national politics.
<h2>Ticket splitting</h2>
From the 1960s through most of the 1980s, between one-quarter and one-half of all <a href="https://library.cqpress.com/elections/">congressional districts routinely split</a> tickets – meaning they sent a politician of one party to Congress while supporting a different party for president. 
These are the <a href="https://centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/the-2024-crossover-house-seats-overall-number-remains-low-with-few-harris-district-republicans/">same few districts</a> in Nebraska and New York, for example, that supported former Vice President Kamala Harris for president in 2024 but which also elected a Republican candidate to the House that same year. 
Since the Reagan years, however, these types of districts that could simultaneously support a Democratic presidential nominee and Republicans for Congress have gone nearly extinct. Today, only a handful of districts split their tickets, and all other districts select the same party for both offices. 
The past two presidential elections, in 2020 and 2024, set the same record low for ticket splitting. Just 16 out of 435 House districts voted for different parties for the House of Representatives and president.
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<h2>Members of Congress follow their voters</h2>
The political success of members of Congress has become increasingly tied up with the success or failure of the president. Because nearly all Republicans hail from districts and states that are very supportive of Trump and his agenda, following the will of their voters increasingly <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2025/02/07/public-anticipates-changes-with-trump-but-is-split-over-whether-they-will-be-good-or-bad/">means being supportive</a> of the president’s agenda. 
Not doing so risks blowback from their Trump-supporting constituents. A June 2025 Quinnipiac University poll <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/polls-show-americans-largely-oppose-trumps-big-beautiful/story?id=123343071">found that 67% of Republicans</a> support the bill, while 87% of Democrats oppose it.
These electoral considerations also help explain the unanimous opposition to Trump’s legislation by the Democrats, nearly all of whom represent districts and states that did not support Trump in 2024. 
Thanks to party polarization in ideologies, geography and in the electorate, few Democrats could survive politically while strongly supporting Trump. And few Republicans could do so while opposing him.
But as the importance to voters of mere presidential support increases, the importance of members’ skill in fighting for issues unique to their districts has decreased. This can leave important local concerns about, for example, unique local environmental issues or declining economic sectors unspoken for. At the very least, members have less incentive to speak for them.<img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/260345/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" />
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/charlie-hunt-1364391">Charlie Hunt</a>, Associate Professor of Political Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/boise-state-university-1983">Boise State University</a>
This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/one-big-beautiful-reason-why-republicans-in-congress-just-cant-quit-donald-trump-260345">original article</a>.
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<title>Mirror Mirror On The Wall, Who Is the Most Woke One Of All</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/mirror-mirror-on-the-wall-who-is-the-most-woke-one-of-all-by-thomas-hoffman/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Thomas Hoffman]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Thu, 03 Jul 2025 02:04:39 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[Disney CEO Bob Igor has called to re-evaluate Disney’s values and focus on entertaining, and refrain from messaging. Disney’s latest re-action remake has inspired some backlash over apparent “wokeness” in Snow White. There is a resistance movement that works to take things for the people-Snow White meets Occupy Wall Street anyone? There are some elements<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/mirror-mirror-on-the-wall-who-is-the-most-woke-one-of-all-by-thomas-hoffman/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/snowwhite-e1751597923943.jpg" alt="" width="760" height="427" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-286325" />
Disney CEO Bob Igor has called to re-evaluate Disney’s values and focus on entertaining, and refrain from messaging. Disney’s latest re-action remake has inspired some backlash over apparent “wokeness” in Snow White. There is a resistance movement that works to take things for the people-Snow White meets Occupy Wall Street anyone? There are some elements of “woke” in the re-make but critics are simply picking up on a trend in a lot of Disney movies and taking it out on Snow White. It isn’t called Snow White And The Seven Socialists. Is it just me or was 2012’s Mirror Mirror much more “woke?” Mirror Mirror featured dwarfs that resembled the United Nations. Mirror Mirror actually reversed the prince rescues princess scenario. Mirror Mirror abolished the whole “poison apple/loves first kiss” segment. Snow White included this element of the story, it is rushed, but included nonetheless. That’s not to say the 2025 Snow White is not flawed. The movie does include all the classic songs, but they are highly abbreviated. This is actually a good thing, as it helps the movie flow. However, there are a number of new songs composed for the movie. These songs all seem longer than the classics, and they all sound the same. Evil Queen Gal Gadot’s voice stays stuck with you, and not in a good way. What’s worse, she sings the same song throughout the movie. A live-action is one thing, but since when did Snow White become an operetta? The seven dwarfs singing actually sounds better the Gadot’s, yet Gadot’s song lasts longer. There is a reason why the music seems recycled from The Greatest Showman, it was. “Where The Good Things Grow” sounds exactly like ”The Greatest Show” with different lyrics. This is a sure fire way to fool someone at a game of “Name That Tune.” Unfortunately, the classic songs are not the only thing shortened. The whole storyline of the resistance feels rushed, which is a shame because it is an interesting twist. It makes sense, one question the animation movie posses was Snow White and the seven dwarfs the only ones resisting the Queen? Another essential concept shortened was the Queen’s transformation. This was actually portrayed via a song, which strips of it its dark magic. Even in the animated movie, as the Queen prepares the potion, the viewer knows this is not just a potion making in progress. A new character, a new evil entity is being created in this scene. Disney passed up a chance to make this scene come to life on screen. In an interview, Cate Blanchett said the 2015 Cinderella said she felt like the remake would make audiences feel like they were being told the story for the first time. She was right. Snow White felt like we were being told a different story, with some elements of the original sprinkled into it. As for Snow White being too woke? Aside from the slight anti-establishment message of the resistance, not really. Snow White is played by a Hispanic actress — but she has no accent, and the male lead and the dwarfs are all as white as, well… snow. If this is political messaging, it’s pretty mild. Unlike 2015’s Cinderella, which truly felt like it was telling the story for the first time, Snow White feels more like a remix — a different story, sprinkled with familiar elements from the original, and a bit of The Greatest Showman.
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<title>AI’s threat to Democracy</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/ais-threat-to-democracy/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[ROBERT A. LEVINE, TMV Columnist]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Wed, 02 Jul 2025 13:56:53 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[Political chicanery with lies and fake news about opposition candidates have been part of the democratic process as long as there have been democracies. You can bet that in ancient Greece and Rome during their democratic periods, candidates and their supporters spread false stories about their opponents to tarnish them in the eyes of the<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/ais-threat-to-democracy/"> […]</a>
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Political chicanery with lies and fake news about opposition candidates have been part of the democratic process as long as there have been democracies. You can bet that in ancient Greece and Rome during their democratic periods, candidates and their supporters spread false stories about their opponents to tarnish them in the eyes of the voters. That’s always been considered normal and expected when elections occur. Candidates try to elevate their own status and denigrate the status of their opponents. However, with the availability and growth of social media in the 21st century, the ability to spread falsehoods and fake stories about a candidate’s opponents and to fabricate positive stories about one’s self has expanded a thousand-fold or more. And with the advent of AI, it’s even worse.
With AI, images of candidates can be created and manipulated to have them saying things that they never said or doing things that they never did. Obviously, opposition candidates could be depicted in various negative and malign acts and making comments about constituents that were degrading and hateful. Each candidate’s tech team could also show the opposition candidate involved in corrupt acts or have other figures criticizing the opposition candidate for corruption. Statistics could also be fabricated showing a candidate’s proposals in a negative light and harming rather than helping his or her constituents. These falsehoods could be broadcast repeatedly over social media by different figures providing them with more authenticity. Candidates could fight back by broadcasting their own versions of events, but those previously implanted ideas would be difficult to rebut. And even if the false narratives swayed a small proportion of the voters, it might be enough to tip an election in favor of the person promoting the falsehoods. With AI, not only could voices be simulated and false photos used, but videos that were completely fabricated could be employed.
Autocratic states like Russia, Belarus, China and Iran could use AI as well to support candidates that they preferred and whom they believed they would be able to manipulate. This is being done currently in Eastern Europe in nations like Romania. There was so much false information about candidates circulated in Romania that the judiciary nullified the first round of voting which will have to be repeated. However, how will fabricated information be blocked the next time around. And other democracies in Europe and Asia will and have faced the same challenges as autocratic nations spread false information to support the candidates they favor, usually the far right.
It is believed by some that Russia may have hacked U.S. social media in the 2016 presidential election to disseminate information that helped Trump win. And it is possible Russia and China have been spreading falsehoods in other important senatorial elections and additional presidential elections. We do not have adequate technology and computer wizards to stop all false information originating from foreign nations and our own country from influencing elections. If a way is not found to block all local and foreign false information on social networks using AI, democracy may have difficulty surviving.
www.robertlevinebooks.com
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<title>The Bloated Billionaire Bill is class warfare</title>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Dick Polman, Cagle Cartoons Columnist]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Wed, 02 Jul 2025 04:25:53 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[What’s most important to remember about the monstrous “big beautiful” bill ginned up by Trump’s Reichstag is that Republicans are just being themselves. They’ve always pined to fatten the fat cats and screw the average citizen – to take from the needy and give to the rich, like Robin Hood in reverse. None of this<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/the-bloated-billionaire-bill-is-class-warfare/"> […]</a>
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What’s most important to remember about the monstrous “big beautiful” bill ginned up by Trump’s Reichstag is that Republicans are just being themselves. They’ve always pined to fatten the fat cats and screw the average citizen – to take from the needy and give to the rich, like Robin Hood in reverse. None of this is new.
What’s different now is the sheer scale of the cruelty, the scope of the destruction, and the spineless fealty to a fascist. And what truly galls me is the Republicans’ repugnant hypocrisy.
In 2011, President Obama proposed tax hikes on the rich in order to buttress crucial federal programs that help tens of millions of Americans. In response, the Pavlovian Republicans barked their favorite rhetorical mantra: Dems are waging class warfare!
On the Sunday talk shows, House bigwig Paul Ryan (remember him?) said, “Class warfare will simply divide this country more.” Senator Lindsey Graham echoed, “When you say you’re going to tax those (rich) people, that’s class warfare.” And when Obama floated similar priorities in 2015, Senator Orrin Hatch inveighed against “redistribution and class warfare,” while, on the House side, Republicans seethed that Obama was “returning to the theme of class warfare.”
If memory serves, the pre-Trump GOP began to chant that phrase, via frequent repetition, some time around 1992. I first heard it that year when Bill Clinton ran for president with a pledge to raise some taxes on the wealthiest Americans. In response, incumbent George H. W. Bush scoffed that his foe was waging “class warfare,” seeking to “divide Americans rich from poor, one group from another.”
See how the game works? Republicans have long instinctively understood, far better than their oft-bumbling opponents, that capturing the language is crucially important. When you do that, when you frame the terms of debate, you have a darn good shot at winning hearts and minds. Particularly weak minds.
I’ll leave it to the shrinks to diagnose the passivity of the Democratic mindset, to try to fathom why the blue party has long allowed class warfare to become a weapon in the GOP’s arsenal. In reality, the Bloated Billionaire Bill is teed up to engineer the most historic transfer of wealth from middle- and low-income Americans to the richest. It’s the GOP that has waged class warfare with great success, most notably in 2001 when George W. Bush’s top-end tax cuts helped exacerbate the growing disparity between the rich and the lower classes; and again in 2017, when Trump’s tax cuts were rigged for the rich at the expense of us lesser beings.
Republicans have long skated relatively unscathed with their insistence that taxing the rich will “divide this country” – when, in fact, the rich have long been reaping disproportionate rewards. I hesitate to cite statistics, because they’re boring and fact-free fools won’t believe them anyway, but here’s something the Wall Street Journal discovered years ago while examining the impact of the Bush tax cuts: “The average tax rate for the top 400 earners in the U.S. fell to as low as 16.62 percent in 2007, from a recent peak of 29.9 percent in 1995.”
As billionaire Warren Buffett said in a 2006 interview, “There’s class warfare all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”
But the richest Americans always want more – hence the current unholy alliance of oligarchy and fascism – and it’s clear that the only way a Republican can risk telling the truth is to quit the game. Exhibit A is Thom Tillis, the North Carolina senator who announced he won’t run for re-election. Having freed himself from servitude, he’s openly pissed that the MAGAts he serves with are waging class warfare against his constituents – 663,000 of whom are projected to lose their Medicaid coverage because the rich supposedly deserve more money.
In theory, Democrats should be well positioned to reap an anti-MAGA backlash in 2026 and “class warfare” should be their battle cry. It’s past time for the blue party to own that phrase and buttress it with the abundant evidence. With that goal in mind, here’s some rhetoric they can use:
“The privileged princes of the new economic dynasties, thirsting for power, (have) reached out for control over government itself. Our allegiance to American institutions requires the overthrow of this kind of power…In vain they seek to hide behind the flag and the Constitution. In their blindness they forget what the flag and the Constitution stand for. Now, as always, they stand for democracy, not tyranny; for freedom, not subjection; and against a dictatorship by mob rule and the over-privileged alike.”
So said Franklin D. Roosevelt, who waged class warfare against the rich and championed the working stiff.
Seriously, how hard should that be?
Copyright 2025 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate. Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes the Subject to Change newsletter. Email him at dickpolman7@gmail.com
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<title>From the marriage contract to breaking the glass under the chuppah, many Jewish couples adapt their weddings to celebrate gender equality</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/from-the-marriage-contract-to-breaking-the-glass-under-the-chuppah-many-jewish-couples-adapt-their-weddings-to-celebrate-gender-equality/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Guest Voice]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Tue, 01 Jul 2025 02:51:46 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[The ketubah is a binding document in Jewish law that traditionally spells out a groom’s responsibilities toward his wife ? but that many couples adapt to be more egalitarian. PowerSiege/iStock via Getty Images Plus Samira Mehta, University of Colorado Boulder Traditional Jewish weddings share one key aspect with traditional Christian weddings. Historically, the ceremony was<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/from-the-marriage-contract-to-breaking-the-glass-under-the-chuppah-many-jewish-couples-adapt-their-weddings-to-celebrate-gender-equality/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[ <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676606/original/file-20250625-56-sft4i9.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C110%2C2121%2C1193&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" /><figcaption>
The ketubah is a binding document in Jewish law that traditionally spells out a groom’s responsibilities toward his wife ? but that many couples adapt to be more egalitarian. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/ktuba-hebrew-religious-marriage-agreement-royalty-free-image/1090742846?phrase=jewish%20wedding&searchscope=image%2Cfilm&adppopup=true">PowerSiege/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a> 
</figcaption><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/samira-mehta-1109963">Samira Mehta</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-colorado-boulder-733">University of Colorado Boulder</a>
Traditional Jewish weddings share one key aspect with traditional Christian weddings. Historically, the ceremony was essentially a transfer of property: A woman went from being the responsibility of her father to being the responsibility of her husband.
That may not be the first thing Americans associate with weddings today, but it lives on in rituals and vows. Think, in a traditional Christian wedding, of a bride promising “to obey” her husband, or being “given away” by her father after he walks her down the aisle. 
Feminism has changed some aspects of the Christian wedding. More egalitarian or feminist couples, for example, might have the bride be “given away” by both her parents, or have both the bride and groom escorted in by parents. Others skip the “giving” altogether. <a href="https://www.pcusastore.com/Content/Site119/FilesSamples/180093Inclusive_00000147003.pdf">Queer couples</a>, too, have <a href="https://forward.com/news/507964/lgbtq-jewish-couples-weddings-reinventing-marriage-traditions/">reimagined the wedding ceremony</a>.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two women wearing white clothes and prayer shawls dance under a simple canopy in a park as a few people look on." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676610/original/file-20250625-56-efyxi8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Mara Mooiweer, left, and Elisheva Dan dance during their socially distanced wedding in Brookline, Mass., during the COVID-19 pandemic. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/mara-mooiweer-left-and-elisheva-dan-dance-during-their-news-photo/1208642339?adppopup=true">Jessica Rinaldi/The Boston Globe via Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<a href="https://www.colorado.edu/jewishstudies/samira-k-mehta">During research</a> for <a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469636368/beyond-chrismukkah/">my book</a> “Beyond Chrismukkah,” about Christian-Jewish interfaith families, many interviewees wound up talking about their weddings and the rituals that they selected or innovated for the day to reflect their cultural background. Some of them had also designed their ceremonies to reflect feminism and marriage equality – something that the interfaith weddings had in common with many weddings where both members of the couple were Jewish.
These values have transformed many Jewish couples’ weddings, just as they have transformed the Christian wedding. Some Jewish couples make many changes, while some make none. And like every faith, Judaism has lots of internal diversity – not all traditional Jewish weddings look the same.
<h2>Contracts and covenants</h2>
Perhaps one of the most important places where feminism and marriage equality have reshaped traditions is in the “ketubah,” or Jewish marriage contract. 
A traditional ketubah is a simple legal document in Hebrew or Aramaic, a related ancient language. Two witnesses sign the agreement, which states that the groom has acquired the bride. However, the ketubah is also sometimes framed as a tool to protect women. The document stipulates the husband’s responsibility to provide for his wife and confirms what he should pay her in case of divorce. <a href="https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/465168/jewish/What-Is-the-Ketubah.htm">Traditional ketubot</a> – the plural of ketubah – did not discuss love, God or intentions for the marriage.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man in a blue-gray suit signs a colorfully decorated piece of paper as another man in a white shirt watches." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676613/original/file-20250625-56-e5iwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
A groom signs the ketubah as witnesses sit beside him in Jerusalem, Israel, in 2014. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-orthodox-jewish-wedding-the-groom-signs-the-ketubah-as-news-photo/515877046?adppopup=true">Dan Porges/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
Contemporary ketubot in more liberal branches of Judaism, whether between opposite- or same-sex couples, are usually <a href="https://ritualwell.org/ritual/egalitarian-ketubah/">much more egalitarian documents</a> that reflect the home and the marriage that the couple want to create. Sometimes the couple <a href="https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/how-to-choose-a-ketubah-or-jewish-marriage-contract/">adapt the Aramaic text</a>; others keep the Aramaic and pair it with a text in the language they speak every day, describing their intentions for their marriage.
Rather than being simple, printed documents, contemporary ketubot are often beautiful pieces of art, made to hang in a place of prominence in the newlyweds’ home. Sometimes the art makes references to traditional Jewish symbols, <a href="https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/9-jewish-things-about-pomegranates/">such as a pomegranate</a> for fertility and love. Other times, <a href="https://dankowicz.com/blog/the-heart-of-your-wedding-designing-your-custom-ketubah/">the artist works with the couple to personalize</a> their decorations with images and symbols that are meaningful to them.
Contemporary couples will often also use their ketubah to address an inherent tension in Jewish marriage. Jewish law gives men much more freedom to divorce than it gives women. Because women cannot generally initiate divorce, <a href="https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/agunot">they can end up as “agunot</a>,” which literally means “chained”: women whose husbands have refused to grant them a religious divorce. Even if the couple have been divorced in secular court, an “agunah” cannot, according to Jewish law, remarry in a religious ceremony.
Contemporary ketubot will sometimes make a note that, while the couple hope to remain married until death, if the marriage deteriorates, the husband agrees to grant a divorce if certain conditions are met. This prevents women from being held hostage in unhappy marriages. 
Other couples eschew the ketubah altogether in favor of a new type of document called a “<a href="https://ketubah-arts.com/rabbi-adlers-brit-ahuvim?srsltid=AfmBOoq6NsGlFb6wQYHjdHAQuQWYXpJ6CYv3QKFxXWyTIJ9DT7HE9yna">brit ahuvim</a>,” or covenant of lovers. These documents are egalitarian agreements between couples. The <a href="https://ritualwell.org/ritual/acquiring-equality/">brit ahuvim</a> was developed by <a href="https://huc.edu/directory/rachel-r-adler-rabbi-ph-d/">Rachel Adler</a>, a feminist rabbi with a deep knowledge of Jewish law, and is grounded in ancient Jewish laws for business partnerships between equals. That said, many Jews, including some feminists, do not see the brit ahuvim as equal in status to a ketubah.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A colorful, framed drawing on a white wall, with two older women barely visible sitting on a couch at the back of the room." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676614/original/file-20250625-56-qq0ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Two female ducks are depicted on the ketubah hanging in the sunroom in Lennie Gerber and Pearl Berlin’s home in High Point, N.C. 
<a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/GayMarriage-NorthCarolina/e47f1b031fb04dbfb5c45645abcd91b5/photo?Query=ketubah&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=11&currentItemNo=1">AP Photo/Allen G. Breed</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>Building together</h2>
Beyond the ketubah, there are any number of other changes that couples make to symbolize their hopes for an egalitarian marriage.
Jewish ceremonies often take place under a canopy called the chuppah, which symbolizes <a href="https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-huppah-or-wedding-canopy/">the home that the couple create together</a>. In a traditional Jewish wedding, the bride circles the groom three or seven times before entering the chuppah. This represents both her protection of their home and that the groom is now <a href="https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/4191420/jewish/Why-Does-the-Bride-Circle-the-Groom-Seven-Times.htm">her priority</a>.
Many couples today omit this custom, because they feel it makes the bride subservient to the groom. Others keep the circling but reinterpret it: In circling the groom, the bride actively creates their home, an act of empowerment. Other egalitarian couples, regardless of their genders, <a href="https://www.smashingtheglass.com/equality-minded-jewish-wedding/">share the act of circling</a>: Each spouse circles three times, and then the pair circle once together. 
In traditional Jewish weddings, like in traditional Christian weddings, the groom gives his bride a ring to symbolize his commitment to her – and perhaps to mark her as a married woman. Many contemporary <a href="https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/double-ring-ceremonies/">Jewish couples exchange two rings</a>: both partners offering a gift to mark their marriage and presenting a symbol of their union to the world. While some see this shift as an adaptation to American culture, realistically, the dual-ring ceremony is <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3790353">a relatively new development</a> in both American Christian and American Jewish marriage ceremonies.
Finally, Jewish weddings traditionally end when the groom stomps on and breaks a glass, and the entire crowd yells “Mazel tov” to congratulate them. People debate <a href="https://18doors.org/breaking_the_glass/">the symbolism of the broken glass</a>. Some say that it reminds us that life contains both joy and sorrow, or that it is a reminder of a foundational crisis in Jewish history: the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem in 70 C.E. Others say that it is a reminder that life is fragile, or that marriage, unlike the glass, is an unbreakable covenant.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man and woman, both wearing white, smile as they raise their joined hands above their heads." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/676615/original/file-20250625-56-3t1ps6.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Yulia Tagil and Stas Granin celebrate their union on July 25, 2010, at a square in Tel Aviv. The couple held a public wedding to protest Israeli marriage guidelines set by the chief rabbinate. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/bride-yulia-tagil-and-grome-stas-granin-celebrate-during-news-photo/103083363?adppopup=true">Uriel Sinai/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
Regardless of what it means, some contemporary couples both step on glasses, or have one partner place their foot on top of the other’s so that the newlyweds can break the glass together. The couple symbolize their commitment to equality – and both get to do a fun wedding custom. 
There are many other innovations in contemporary Jewish weddings that have much less to do with feminism and egalitarianism, such as personalized wedding canopies or wedding programs. But these key changes represent how the wedding ceremony itself has become more egalitarian in response to both feminism and marriage equality.<img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/229084/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" />
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/samira-mehta-1109963">Samira Mehta</a>, Associate Professor of Women and Gender Studies & Jewish Studies, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-colorado-boulder-733">University of Colorado Boulder</a>
This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-the-marriage-contract-to-breaking-the-glass-under-the-chuppah-many-jewish-couples-adapt-their-weddings-to-celebrate-gender-equality-229084">original article</a>.
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<title>PRAYER FOR AMERICA</title>
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<pubDate>Tue, 01 Jul 2025 02:28:44 +0000</pubDate>
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<title>Kristi Noem Secretly Took a Cut of Political Donations</title>
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<pubDate>Tue, 01 Jul 2025 02:24:11 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[Kristi Noem Secretly Took a Cut of Political Donations by Justin Elliott, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox. In 2023, while Kristi Noem was governor of South Dakota, she supplemented her income by<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/kristi-noem-secretly-took-a-cut-of-political-donations/"> […]</a>
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<h1>Kristi Noem Secretly Took a Cut of Political Donations</h1>
by Justin Elliott, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski
ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for <a href="https://www.propublica.org/newsletters/the-big-story?source=reprint&placement=top-note">The Big Story newsletter</a> to receive stories like this one in your inbox.
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In 2023, while Kristi Noem was governor of South Dakota, she supplemented her income by secretly accepting a cut of the money she raised for a nonprofit that promotes her political career, tax records show.
In what experts described as a highly unusual arrangement, the nonprofit routed funds to a personal company of Noem’s that had recently been established in Delaware. The payment totaled $80,000 that year, a significant boost to her roughly $130,000 government salary. Since the nonprofit is a so-called dark money group — one that’s not required to disclose the names of its donors — the original source of the money remains unknown.
Noem then failed to disclose the $80,000 payment to the public. After President Donald Trump selected Noem to be his secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, she had to release a detailed accounting of her assets and sources of income from 2023 on. She did not include the income from the dark money group on <a href="https://extapps2.oge.gov/201/Presiden.nsf/PAS+Index/E8FA62012957FA1C85258C130032F362/$FILE/Noem%2C%20Kristi%20%20final278.pdf">her disclosure form</a>, which experts called a likely violation of federal ethics requirements.
Experts told ProPublica it was troubling that Noem was personally taking money that came from political donors. In a filing, the group, a nonprofit called American Resolve Policy Fund, described <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/932286963/202413209349300031/IRS990ScheduleG">the $80,000</a> as a payment for fundraising. The organization said Noem had brought in hundreds of thousands of dollars.
There is nothing remarkable about a politician raising money for nonprofits and other groups that promote their campaigns or agendas. What’s unusual, experts said, is for a politician to keep some of the money for themselves.
“If donors to these nonprofits are not just holding the keys to an elected official’s political future but also literally providing them with their income, that’s new and disturbing,” said Daniel Weiner, a former Federal Election Commission attorney who now leads the Brennan Center’s work on campaign finance.
ProPublica discovered details of the payment in the annual tax form of American Resolve Policy Fund, which is part of a <a href="https://www.theamericanresolve.com/">network of political groups</a> that promote Noem and her agenda. The nonprofit describes its mission as “fighting to preserve America for the next generation.” There’s little evidence in the public domain that the group has done much. In its first year, its main expenditures were paying Noem and covering the cost of some unspecified travel. It also maintains social media accounts devoted to promoting Noem. It has 100 followers on X.
In a statement, Noem’s lawyer, Trevor Stanley, said, “Then-Governor Noem fully complied with the letter and the spirit of the law” and that the Office of Government Ethics, which processes disclosure forms for federal officials, “analyzed and cleared her financial information in regards to this entity.” Stanley did not respond to follow-up questions about whether the ethics office was aware of the $80,000 payment.
Stanley also said that “Secretary Noem fully disclosed all of her income on public documents that are readily available.” Asked for evidence of that, given that Noem didn’t report the $80,000 payment on her federal financial disclosure form, Stanley did not respond.
Before being named Homeland Security secretary, overseeing immigration enforcement, Noem spent two decades in South Dakota’s government and the U.S. House of Representatives, drawing a public servant’s salary. Her husband, Bryon Noem, runs a small insurance brokerage with two offices in the state. Between his company and his real estate holdings, he has at least $2 million in assets, according to Noem’s filing.
While she is among the least wealthy members of Trump’s Cabinet, her personal spending habits have attracted notice. Noem was photographed wearing a gold <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/style/kristi-noem-venezuela-prison-rolex-watch.html">Rolex Cosmograph Daytona watch</a> that costs nearly $50,000 as she toured the Salvadoran prison where her agency is sending immigrants. In April, after her purse was stolen at a Washington, D.C., restaurant, it emerged she was carrying <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/noem-felt-bag-dragged-thought-grandchild/story?id=121138202">$3,000 in cash</a>, which an official said was for “dinner, activities, and Easter gifts.” She was criticized for <a href="https://apnews.com/article/noem-travel-taxpayers-south-dakota-homeland-security-c2655e00a16d44bba46c60a14a638f5d">using taxpayer money</a> as governor to pay for expenses related to trips to Paris, to Canada for bear hunting and to Houston to have dental work done. At the time, Noem denied misusing public funds.
Noem’s personal company, an LLC called Ashwood Strategies, shares a name with one of her horses. It was registered in Delaware early in her second term as South Dakota governor, around 1 p.m. on June 22, 2023. Four minutes later, the nonprofit American Resolve Policy Fund was incorporated in Delaware too.
American Resolve raised $1.1 million in 2023, according to its <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/932286963/202413209349300031/full">tax filing</a>. The group reported that it had zero employees, and what it did with that money is largely unclear.
In 2023, the nonprofit spent only about $220,000 of its war chest — with more than a third of that going to Noem’s LLC. The rest mostly went toward administrative expenses and a roughly $84,000 travel budget. It’s not clear whose travel the group paid for.
The nonprofit reported that it sent the $80,000 fundraising fee to Noem’s LLC as payment for bringing in $800,000, a 10% cut. A professional fundraiser who also raised money for the group was paid a lower rate of 7%.
In the intervening years, American Resolve has maintained a low public profile. In March, it <a href="https://www.thedakotascout.com/p/pac-with-ties-to-kristi-noem-behind">purchased Facebook ads</a> attacking a local news outlet in South Dakota, which had been reporting on Noem’s use of government credit cards. Noem’s lawyer did not answer questions about whether the group paid her more money after 2023, the most recent year for which its tax filing is available.
The nonprofit has an affiliated political committee, American Resolve PAC, that’s been more active, at least in public. Touting Noem’s conservative leadership under a picture of her staring off into the sky, its website said the PAC was created to put “Kristi and her team on the ground in key races across America.” Noem traveled the country last year attending events the PAC sponsored in support of Republican candidates.
American Resolve’s treasurer referred questions to Noem’s lawyer. In his statement, Noem’s lawyer said she “did not establish, finance, maintain, or control American Resolve Fund. She was simply a vender for a non-profit entity.”
While Noem failed to report the fundraising income Ashwood Strategies received on her federal financial disclosure, she did provide some other details. She described the LLC as involving “personal activities outside my official gubernatorial capacity” and noted that it received the $140,000 advance for her book “No Going Back.” The LLC also had a bank account with between $100,001 and $250,000 in it and at least $50,000 of “livestock and equipment,” she reported.
The fact that Ashwood Strategies is Noem’s company only emerged through the confirmation process for her Trump Cabinet post. South Dakota has minimal disclosure rules for elected officials, and Noem had not previously divulged that she created a side business while she was governor.
Noem’s outside income may have run afoul of South Dakota law, according to <a href="https://southdakotasearchlight.com/2024/04/05/from-fringe-to-foreground-loose-cannon-lawmaker-departs-as-leading-legislative-voice/">Lee Schoenbeck</a>, a veteran Republican politician and attorney who was until recently the head of the state Senate. The<a href="https://sdlegislature.gov/Statutes/3-8-1"></a><a href="https://sdlegislature.gov/Statutes/3-8-1">law requires</a> top officials, including the governor, to devote their full time to their official roles.
“There’s no way the governor is supposed to have a private side business that the public doesn’t know about,” Schoenbeck told ProPublica. “It would clearly not be appropriate.”
Noem’s lawyer said South Dakota law allowed her to receive income from the nonprofit.
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Do you have any information we should know about Kristi Noem or other administration officials? Justin Elliott can be reached by email at <a href="mailto:justin@propublica.org">justin@propublica.org</a> and by Signal or WhatsApp at 774-826-6240. Josh Kaplan can be reached by email at <a href="mailto:joshua.kaplan@propublica.org">joshua.kaplan@propublica.org</a> and by Signal or WhatsApp at 734-834-9383.
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<title>What the Supreme Court ruling against ‘universal injunctions’ means for court challenges to presidential actions</title>
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<pubDate>Sat, 28 Jun 2025 14:04:30 +0000</pubDate>
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<description><![CDATA[A journalist runs out of the U.S. Supreme Court building carrying a ruling on the last day of the court’s term on June 27, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Cassandra Burke Robertson, Case Western Reserve University When presidents have tried to make big changes through executive orders, they have often hit a roadblock:<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/what-the-supreme-court-ruling-against-universal-injunctions-means-for-court-challenges-to-presidential-actions/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[ <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/677127/original/file-20250627-56-5pdnys.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=524%2C55%2C4306%2C2416&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" /><figcaption>
A journalist runs out of the U.S. Supreme Court building carrying a ruling on the last day of the court’s term on June 27, 2025, in Washington, D.C. 
<a class="source" href="http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/often-referred-to-as-the-running-of-the-interns-a-news-photo/2222462029?adppopup=true">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/cassandra-burke-robertson-343725">Cassandra Burke Robertson</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/case-western-reserve-university-1506">Case Western Reserve University</a>
When presidents have tried to make big changes through executive orders, they have often hit a roadblock: A single federal judge, whether located in Seattle or Miami or anywhere in between, could <a href="https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48476">stop these policies</a> across the entire country. 
But on June 27, 2025, the Supreme Court significantly limited this judicial power. In <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/24a884_8n59.pdf">Trump v. CASA Inc.</a>, a 6-3 majority ruled that federal courts likely lack the authority to issue “universal injunctions” that block government policies nationwide. The ruling means that going forward federal judges can generally only block policies from being enforced against the specific plaintiffs who filed the lawsuit, not against everyone in the country.
The ruling emerged from a case challenging President Trump’s executive order attempting to end birthright citizenship. While <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/article/what-to-know-about-the-supreme-court-case-on-birthright-citizenship-and-nationwide-injunctions/">three federal courts</a> had blocked the policy nationwide, the Supreme Court allowed it to proceed against anyone who isn’t a named plaintiff in the lawsuits. This creates a legal environment where the same government policy can be simultaneously blocked for some people but enforced against others.
Crucially, the court based its decision on interpreting the <a href="https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/federal-judiciary-act">Judiciary Act of 1789</a> – not the Constitution – meaning Congress could restore this judicial power simply by passing new legislation.
But what exactly are these injunctions, and why do they matter to everyday Americans?
<h2>Immediate, irreparable harm</h2>
When the government creates a policy that might violate the Constitution or federal law, affected people can sue in federal court to stop it. While these lawsuits work their way through the courts – a process that often takes years – judges can issue what are called “preliminary injunctions” to <a href="https://www.aei.org/op-eds/problems-with-universal-injunctions-against-trumps-program/">temporarily pause</a> the policy if they determine it might cause immediate, irreparable harm.
A “<a href="https://judicature.duke.edu/articles/one-for-all-are-nationwide-injunctions-legal/">nationwide</a>” injunction – sometimes called a “universal” injunction – goes further by stopping the policy for everyone across the country, not just for the people who filed the lawsuit.
Importantly, these injunctions are designed to be temporary. They merely preserve the status quo until courts can fully examine the case’s merits. But in practice, litigation proceeds so slowly that executive actions blocked by the courts often expire when successor administrations <a href="https://aboutblaw.com/bhx7">abandon the policies</a>. 
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Title page of a U.S. Senate bill to ban most nationwide injunctions." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659314/original/file-20250402-62-uttgh1.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
Legislation introduced by GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley would ban judges from issuing most nationwide injunctions. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.grassley.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/judicial_relief_clarification_act.pdf">Sen. Chuck Grassley office</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>More executive orders, more injunctions</h2>
Nationwide injunctions <a href="https://harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/920-1009_Online.pdf">aren’t new</a>, but several things have made them more contentious recently.
First, since a closely divided and polarized Congress <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/going-nowhere-a-gridlocked-congress/">rarely passes major legislation anymore</a>, presidents rely more on executive orders to get substantive things done. This creates <a href="https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48476">more opportunities to challenge</a> presidential actions in court. 
Second, lawyers who want to challenge these orders got better at “<a href="https://www.gwlr.org/get-in-litigants-were-going-judge-shopping/">judge shopping</a>” – filing cases in districts where they’re likely to get judges who agree with their client’s views. 
Third, with growing political division, <a href="https://lawreview.colorado.edu/print/volume91/seeing-beyond-courts-the-political-context-of-the-nationwide-injunction/">both parties</a> used these injunctions more aggressively whenever the other party controls the White House.
<h2>Affecting real people</h2>
These legal fights have tangible consequences for millions of Americans.
Take DACA, the common name for the program formally called <a href="https://library.law.howard.edu/civilrightshistory/immigration/daca">Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals</a>, which protects about 500,000 young immigrants from deportation. For <a href="https://www.nilc.org/resources/timeline-daca-in-the-courts/">more than 10 years</a>, these young immigrants, known as “Dreamers,” have faced constant uncertainty. 
That’s because, when President <a href="https://www.obama.org/stories/daca-10-years/">Barack Obama created DACA</a> in 2012 and sought to expand it via executive order in 2015, a Texas judge <a href="https://www.nilc.org/resources/timeline-daca-in-the-courts/">blocked the expansion</a> with a nationwide injunction. When Trump tried to <a href="https://www.cliniclegal.org/resources/humanitarian-relief/multiple-lawsuits-challenge-daca-rescission">end DACA</a>, judges in California, New York and Washington, D.C. blocked that move. The program, and the legal challenges to it, continued under President Joe Biden. Now, the second Trump administration faces continued legal challenges over the <a href="https://www.nilc.org/resources/latest-daca-developments/">constitutionality</a> of the DACA program.
More recently, judges have used nationwide injunctions to block several Trump policies. <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/birthright-citizenship-cases-arrive-at-the-supreme-court">Three courts</a> stopped the president’s attempt to deny citizenship to babies born to mothers who lack legal permanent residency in the United States – the cases that led the Supreme Court to limit the reach of injunctions. Judges have also temporarily <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/nationwide-injunctions-central-trumps-feud-judges/story?id=119990974">blocked Trump’s efforts</a> to ban transgender people from serving in the military and to freeze some federal funding for a variety of programs.
Nationwide injunctions have also blocked congressional legislation. 
The Corporate Transparency Act, <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/co/start/strategy/small-business-corporate-transparency-act">passed in 2021 and originally scheduled to go into effect in 2024</a>, combats financial crimes by requiring businesses to disclose their true owners to the government. A Texas judge <a href="https://www.mayerbrown.com/en/insights/publications/2024/12/federal-court-suspends-enforcement-of-corporate-transparency-act-nationwide">blocked this law</a> in 2024 after gun stores challenged it.
In early 2025, the Supreme Court <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/01/justices-allow-enforcement-of-corporate-transparency-law-to-go-forward/">allowed the law</a> to take effect, but the Trump administration announced it simply <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/birthright-citizenship-cases-arrive-at-the-supreme-court">wouldn’t enforce it</a> – showing how these legal battles can become political power struggles.
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man in a dark suit at a desk holding a folder with white pages in it." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/659323/original/file-20250402-56-k60xdg.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"/></a><figcaption>
A polarized Congress rarely passes major legislation anymore, so presidents – including Donald Trump – have relied on executive orders to get things done. 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-donald-trump-holds-up-an-executive-order-after-news-photo/2194978801?adppopup=true">Christopher Furlong/Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption></figure>
<h2>A ruling that Congress could change</h2>
<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/24a884_8n59.pdf">The Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. CASA</a> was notably narrow in its legal reasoning. The court explicitly stated that its ruling “rests solely on the statutory authority that federal courts possess under the Judiciary Act of 1789” and that it expressed “no view on the Government’s argument that Article III forecloses universal relief.”
This distinction matters enormously. Because the court based its decision on interpreting a congressional statute rather than the Constitution itself, Congress has the power to overturn the ruling simply by passing new legislation that authorizes federal judges to issue nationwide injunctions.
The Supreme Court’s majority opinion, written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, emphasized that universal injunctions “likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has granted to federal courts” under the Judiciary Act of 1789. The court found these injunctions lack sufficient historical precedent in traditional equity practice.
However, the three dissenting justices strongly disagreed. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, focused on the importance of birthright citizenship, explaining that “every court to evaluate the Order has deemed it patently unconstitutional.” 
As a result, <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/deadline-legal-blog/supreme-court-birthright-citizenship-ruling-injunctions-trump-rcna207129">the dissent argues</a>, “the Government instead tries its hand at a different game. It asks this Court to hold that, no matter how illegal a law or policy, courts can never simply tell the Executive to stop enforcing it against anyone.”
<h2>Legislative solutions on the table</h2>
Congress was already <a href="https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/house-judiciary-subcommittees-holding-hearing-federal-courts/">considering legislation</a> to limit judges’ ability to grant nationwide injunctions.
Another way to address the concerns about a single judge blocking government action would be to require <a href="https://harvardlawreview.org/blog/2018/01/an-old-solution-to-the-nationwide-injunction-problem/">a three-judge panel</a> to hear cases involving nationwide injunctions, requiring at least two of them to agree. This is similar to how <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/07/opinion/supreme-court-vaccine-mandate.html">courts handled</a> major civil rights cases in the 1950s and 1960s.
<a href="https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/faculty_publications/2326/">My research on this topic</a> suggests that three judges working together would be less likely to make partisan decisions, while still being able to protect constitutional rights when necessary. Today’s technology also makes it <a href="https://www.zoom.com/en/industry/government/resources/future-of-courts/">easier for judges</a> in different locations to work together than it was decades ago.
<h2>What comes next</h2>
With the Supreme Court limiting judges’ ability to issue nationwide injunctions based on an old statute, the ball is now in Congress’ court. Lawmakers could choose to restore this judicial power with new legislation, further restrict it, or leave the current limitations in place.
Until Congress acts, the legal landscape has fundamentally shifted.
Future challenges to presidential actions may require either cumbersome class action lawsuits or a patchwork of individual cases – potentially leaving many Americans without immediate protection from policies that courts determine violate the Constitution. But unlike a constitutional ruling, this outcome isn’t permanent: Congress holds the key to change it.
This is an updated and expanded version of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-a-lone-judge-can-block-a-trump-order-nationwide-and-why-from-daca-to-doge-this-judicial-check-on-presidents-power-is-shaping-how-the-government-works-252556">story originally published</a> on April 3, 2025.<img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/260040/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" />
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/cassandra-burke-robertson-343725">Cassandra Burke Robertson</a>, Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Professional Ethics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/case-western-reserve-university-1506">Case Western Reserve University</a>
This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-supreme-court-ruling-against-universal-injunctions-means-for-court-challenges-to-presidential-actions-260040">original article</a>.
The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/what-the-supreme-court-ruling-against-universal-injunctions-means-for-court-challenges-to-presidential-actions/">What the Supreme Court ruling against ‘universal injunctions’ means for court challenges to presidential actions</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com">The Moderate Voice</a>.
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<title>Honoring Gary––An Alternative to a Traditional Memorial Service</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/honoring-gary-an-alternative-to-a-traditional-memorial-service/</link>
<comments>https://themoderatevoice.com/honoring-gary-an-alternative-to-a-traditional-memorial-service/#respond</comments>
<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jane Knox]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jun 2025 05:28:16 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[Death]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Inspiration and Living]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Passages]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Cremation]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Dying]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Inspiration]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[memorial service]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Religion]]></category>
<guid isPermaLink="false">https://themoderatevoice.com/?p=286282</guid>
<description><![CDATA[As you know, my brother, Gary passed away on January 4, 2025. Before he died, Gary expressed his strong feelings that he did not want a traditional funeral. He wasn’t religious, and he was not connected to a church. He wanted to be cremated. Gary wanted his ashes buried in the garden of the home<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/honoring-gary-an-alternative-to-a-traditional-memorial-service/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/dreamstime_s_32786033-e1751002718577.jpg" alt="" width="760" height="474" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-286290" />
As you know, my brother, Gary passed away on January 4, 2025. Before he died, Gary expressed his strong feelings that he did not want a traditional funeral. He wasn’t religious, and he was not connected to a church. He wanted to be cremated. Gary wanted his ashes buried in the garden of the home where he lived for many years and where his son, Ryan, now lives. Gary’s planning stopped there. How we would honor and memorialize Gary, was left to his wife, Andrea, son, Ryan and daughter, Laura, to discover.
The first decision was when this remembrance would take place. Andrea chose a date that was meaningful ––April 19th, the day before Easter, and five days before his birthday on April 24th. Andrea wanted a private celebration for family. It would be held at the once small house he and Andrea had bought, and Gary had redesigned, remodeled and expanded. Recently, they had sold this lovely property to their son, Ryan.
In the months between his father’s death and the Day of Remembrance, Ryan created a memorial garden for his dad on the upward slope behind the house. Now, the house and the acreage had a history with the Knox family that made this setting even more meaningful. The house had originally been part of the Earl estate. Mrs. Earl was a Vanderbilt, and our father was employed by her for over 20 years. Our parents and I, for a time, lived on the estate. Thus, the land where Gary now rests is connected to family history.
So, we had a date, a setting and a purpose––to bury Gary’s ashes as he wished. Now, who would be involved? Andrea invited members of the immediate and extended family––from Oregon and Florida, northern and eastern Connecticut, as well as local family members.
I appreciated Andrea’s idea to gather everyone inside what is now Ryan’s, and his wife, Susan’s home, for coffee and nibbles before the actual ceremony. This was our opportunity to connect before going deeper to create the collective spirit of the ritual. Then, it was time to move outdoors into the garden Ryan had prepared to receive his father’s ashes.
Mother nature was beautifully present on this special day. The backdrop was a beautiful spring day and the daffodils and forsythia with their yellow flowers were glorious.
The garden was on the upward slope behind the house. Ryan had mulched and planted ornamental trees and bushes. He had placed potted flowers from several of us around the garden. Chairs were arranged in rows on one side. There were twenty of us and three children. We walked up the slope and took our seats.
Ryan stood before us and welcomed us to share in this ritual for his father. A tall evergreen tree was planted at the highest place in this memorial garden. It is so fitting the tree is tall because Gary was always the tallest person in the family. Ryan had the container with Gary’s remains beside him. He dug a hollow in front of the tree and placed some of Gary’s ashes into the earth. Andrea and Laura, followed. Next came the grandchildren Jacob, Leah and Anna. The rest of the family members, one by one, also reverently placed Gary’s ashes in the earth. Some used a trowel, others their bare hands.
It felt like each one of us was blessing Gary by placing his ashes beneath the tree. His ashes will nourish the living tree.
Next, Andrea stood before us and shared about her life with Gary.
Andrea talked about the beautifully written love letters Gary had written her every day when he was drafted in the army. She said that when she recently looked them over, one fell out and she chose to read that love letter today to our gathering. Their marriage was a love story that lasted over fifty years.
Andrea inspired everyone to share memories of Gary, whether they were spontaneous or prepared. It was amazing how many people mentioned Gary’s generosity to relatives and friends. If he knew there was a need, he would be there to help. Gary tended to quietly take care of things for all of us without making a big deal about it. He was never looking to take credit for all his good deeds.
After the ashes and the sharing, it was time for everyone to collect at Venice Restaurant in town. It was always a favorite of Gary’s. We had our own separate dining room and individual menus with Gary’s name on top. Throughout the ages there is something about the practice of eating together, or “breaking bread,” that goes beyond the basic need for food. I wonder if one of the reasons is to feel grounded after such a spiritual experience. People talk, share stories, celebrate love on a worldly level. Also, people acknowledge the efforts of the caretakers who expended so much energy to care for their loved one. Andea’s devotion to her husband was amazing. Laura and Ryan spent hours being with their father before his passing.
The meal provides a moment of rest, and an unstated acknowledgment that although a loved one has been lost, the family will go on living. This communal meal brings a recognition, as well, that there are roles that have shifted. Ryan, rather than Gary, is now the elder male Knox of the family.
Reflecting back on Gary’s memorial, I am astonished at what we achieved without the formality of a religious figure –– no priest, rabbi or minister was present. It was the blending of hearts that made a special, spiritual experience that nourished us all.
<a href="https://byjaneknox.com/the-ageless-goddess-blog/f/a-lullaby-for-crossing-over">Originally published on The Ageless Goddess blog.</a>
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<title>BOMBS OVER BROADWAY</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/bombs-over-broadway/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Clay Jones]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jun 2025 05:13:54 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[Cartoons]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[2021 New York City Mayoral Election]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Andrew Cuomo]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Clay Jones]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[F-word]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[New York City]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Zohran Mamdani]]></category>
<guid isPermaLink="false">https://themoderatevoice.com/?p=286279</guid>
<description><![CDATA[I gotta be honest with you. I didn’t think Trump’s F-bomb was anything unique or scandalous in the New Normal. Sure, it’s not presidential for a president to say, “They don’t know what the fuck they’re doing” to reporters while standing in the White House driveway, but none of this has been presidential. So, I<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/bombs-over-broadway/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/CjonesRGB06262025-scaled-e1751000204680.jpg" alt="" width="760" height="574" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-286280" />
I gotta be honest with you. I didn’t think Trump’s F-bomb was anything unique or scandalous in the New Normal. Sure, it’s not presidential for a president to say, “They don’t know what the fuck they’re doing” to reporters while standing in the White House driveway, but none of this has been presidential.
So, I didn’t think it was cartoon worthy, but then I saw one yesterday, and another one today, and then another one, and then another one, which means there are going to be at least 12 more by the end of the day. I decided to use it myself in doing a cartoon on the New York City Democratic mayoral primary, but put a little twist on it.
Political Cartooning 101 lesson: Use the F-bomb in your cartoon as a tool, but don’t make the cartoon about the F-bomb…unless it’s too funny to resist.
Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo was and maybe still is trying to resurrect his political career after resigning in disgrace after being accused of sexual harassment by at least 11 women, which is less than half the number of women who have accused Donald Trump, yet his political career is still going. And former senator Al Franken is now playing a fictional senator in a limited Netflix series.
Cuomo was the favorite to win the Democratic primary, but unfortunately for him, it was rank-choice voting, where voters rank candidates for office in order of their preference. This system gave the nomination to young upstart Zohran Mamdani, an Islamic democratic- socialist state assemblyman with very few legislative accomplishments. And this is what I meant when I said Cuomo was/is trying to resurrect his political career.
Of course, Cuomo’s bid to become the Democratic nominee for NYC’s mayor is over, but not his bid to become mayor…unless he changes his mind and removes himself from the ballot, as Cuomo is now running as an Independent.
Previously, victory in the Democratic primary all but guaranteed a move to Gracie Mansion, as Democrats outnumber Republicans 6-1 in the Big Apple. But now, it may be a five-way race.
Rank-choice will not be implemented in the general election, where Mamdani will have to compete once again against Cuomo, but also against current mayor and bribe-taker Eric Adams (who will have Donald Trump’s support), Guardian Angels founder and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa (who had no opposition for the nomination), and former federal prosecutor Jim Walden, who is also running as an Independent. And I’m sure there are a few dozen other never-heard-of-before dingbats on the ballot.
While some pollsters may predict that Mamdani will win the general election, you can’t be too sure with his socialist platform, that Cuomo’s still in the race, and NYC has the largest Jewish population in the world outside Israel. If Cuomo does drop out, I’d predict Mamdani to win.
<a href="https://claytoonz.substack.com/p/f-bombs-over-broadway">GO HERE TO READ THE REST.</a>
<a href="http://www.claytoonz.com">Visit Clay Jones’ website </a>and email him at clayjonz@gmail.com.
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<title>Using TikTok could be making you more politically polarized, new study finds</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/using-tiktok-could-be-making-you-more-politically-polarized-new-study-finds/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[Guest Voice]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jun 2025 04:53:52 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Echo chambers]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Polarization]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[research]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[social media]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Technology]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[TikTok]]></category>
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<description><![CDATA[Are you in an echo chamber on TikTok? LeoPatrizi/E+ via Getty Images Zicheng Cheng, University of Arizona People on TikTok tend to follow accounts that align with their own political beliefs, meaning the platform is creating political echo chambers among its users. These findings, from a study my collaborators, Yanlin Li and Homero Gil de<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/using-tiktok-could-be-making-you-more-politically-polarized-new-study-finds/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[ <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/676642/original/file-20250625-56-srezty.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C351%2C6720%2C3780&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" /><figcaption>
Are you in an echo chamber on TikTok? 
<a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/group-of-teenage-friend-focused-on-their-own-royalty-free-image/1140174168">LeoPatrizi/E+ via Getty Images</a> 
</figcaption><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/zicheng-cheng-2403964">Zicheng Cheng</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-arizona-959">University of Arizona</a>
People on TikTok tend to follow accounts that align with their own political beliefs, meaning the platform is creating political echo chambers among its users. These findings, from a study my collaborators, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=lGSv_tUAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">Yanlin Li</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=T3VspYkAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">Homero Gil de Zúñiga</a>, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=mtfhEIMAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">and I</a> published in the academic journal <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251339755">New Media & Society</a>, show that people mostly hear from voices they already agree with.
We analyzed the structure of different political networks on TikTok and found that right-leaning communities are more isolated from other political groups and from mainstream news outlets. Looking at their internal structures, the right-leaning communities are more tightly connected than their left-leaning counterparts. In other words, conservative TikTok users tend to stick together. They rarely follow accounts with opposing views or mainstream media accounts. Liberal users, on the other hand, are more likely to follow a mix of accounts, including those they might disagree with.
Our study is based on a massive dataset of over 16 million TikTok videos from more than 160,000 public accounts between 2019 and 2023. We saw a spike of political TikTok videos during the 2020 U.S. presidential election. More importantly, people aren’t just passively watching political content; they’re actively creating political content themselves. 
Some people are more outspoken about politics than others. We found that users with stronger political leanings and those who get more likes and comments on their videos are more motivated to keep posting. This shows the power of partisanship, but also the power of TikTok’s social rewards system. Engagement signals – likes, shares, comments – are like a fuel, encouraging users to create even more.
<h2>Why it matters</h2>
People are turning to TikTok not just for a good laugh. A recent <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/09/17/more-americans-regularly-get-news-on-tiktok-especially-young-adults/">Pew Research Center survey</a> shows that almost 40% of U.S. adults under 30 regularly get news on TikTok. The question becomes what kind of news are they watching, and what does that mean for how they engage with politics.
The content on TikTok often comes from creators and influencers or <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.60625/risj-gfyx-3v66">digital-native media sources</a>. The quality of this news content remains uncertain. Without access to balanced, fact-based information, people may struggle to make informed political decisions.
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3vpfKZ-7ir4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe><figcaption>TikTok is not unique; social media generally fosters polarization.</figcaption></figure>
Amid the debates over <a href="https://theconversation.com/should-governments-ban-tiktok-can-they-a-cybersecurity-expert-explains-the-risks-the-app-poses-and-the-challenges-to-blocking-it-202300">banning TikTok</a>, our study highlights how TikTok can be a double-edged sword in political communication. It’s encouraging to see people participate in politics through TikTok when that’s their medium of choice. However, if a user’s network is closed and homogeneous and their expression serves as in-group validation, it may further solidify the political echo chamber.
When people are exposed to one-sided messages, it can increase hostility toward outgroups. In the long run, relying on TikTok as a source for political information might deepen people’s political views and contribute to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055423001211">greater polarization</a>.
<h2>What other research is being done</h2>
Echo chambers have been widely studied on platforms like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2023301118">Twitter and Facebook</a>, but similar research on TikTok is in its infancy. TikTok is drawing scrutiny, particularly its role in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/08944393231178603">news production</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v11i2.6348">political messaging</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051231157452">social movements</a>. 
TikTok has its unique format, algorithmic curation and entertainment-driven design. I believe that its function as a tool for political communication calls for closer examination.
<h2>What’s next</h2>
In 2024, the <a href="https://time.com/6694077/president-biden-tiktok/">Biden/Harris</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/08/08/trump-tiktok-celebrity-videos-/">Trump</a> campaigns joined TikTok to reach young voters. My research team is now analyzing how these political communication dynamics may have shifted during the 2024 election. Future research could use experiments to explore whether these campaign videos significantly influence voters’ perceptions and behaviors.
The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/research-brief-83231">Research Brief</a> is a short take on interesting academic work.<img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/258791/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" />
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/zicheng-cheng-2403964">Zicheng Cheng</a>, Assistant Professor of Mass Communications, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-arizona-959">University of Arizona</a>
This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/using-tiktok-could-be-making-you-more-politically-polarized-new-study-finds-258791">original article</a>.
The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/using-tiktok-could-be-making-you-more-politically-polarized-new-study-finds/">Using TikTok could be making you more politically polarized, new study finds</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com">The Moderate Voice</a>.
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<title>TOTAL OBLITERATION OF THE TRUTH</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/total-obliteration-of-the-truth/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[CAGLE CARTOONS]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jun 2025 04:38:47 +0000</pubDate>
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<category><![CDATA[Iran bombing]]></category>
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<description><![CDATA[The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/total-obliteration-of-the-truth/">TOTAL OBLITERATION OF THE TRUTH</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://themoderatevoice.com">The Moderate Voice</a>.
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<title>Religious Abuse: Divorce Edition</title>
<link>https://themoderatevoice.com/religious-abuse-divorce-edition/</link>
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<dc:creator><![CDATA[David Robertson]]></dc:creator>
<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jun 2025 00:08:17 +0000</pubDate>
<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
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<category><![CDATA[Inspiration and Living]]></category>
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<category><![CDATA[Divorce]]></category>
<category><![CDATA[Remarriage]]></category>
<guid isPermaLink="false">https://themoderatevoice.com/?p=286256</guid>
<description><![CDATA[If you want to drive people away from churches, then one way to do so is to heap religious abuse on people who are already victims of abuse. Nobody excels at heaping religious abuse more than preachers who are ignorant about the cultural contexts of Bible passages. One sees such ignorance in the way that<a class="read-more" href="https://themoderatevoice.com/religious-abuse-divorce-edition/"> […]</a>
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<content:encoded><![CDATA[<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Divorce.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="350" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-286257" srcset="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Divorce.jpg 300w, https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Divorce-257x300.jpg 257w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
If you want to drive people away from churches, then one way to do so is to heap religious abuse on people who are already victims of abuse. Nobody excels at heaping religious abuse more than preachers who are ignorant about the cultural contexts of Bible passages.
One sees such ignorance in the way that some preachers deal with the topics of divorce and remarriage. An example of such appeared on Twitter/X dot com on 26 June 2025. It was then that <a href="https://x.com/RevKimWChafee/status/1938281521644810324" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Rev. Kim W. Chafee posted the following:</a>
<img loading="lazy" src="https://64.media.tumblr.com/2da0d83111f762115a4ec430974180f4/7488d302e423dcc7-7a/s540x810/1eae08078ce0b00f1a15e153de95d92a2a3a4d24.jpg" width="540" height="648" class="aligncenter size-full" />
This blogger sides with Rev. Chafee on this matter. So does the United Methodist Church, which this blogger joined in Year 2024.
From the <a href="https://issuu.com/cokesbury/docs/the_book_of_discipline_of_the_united_methodist_chu?fr=xKAE9_zU1NQ" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church (2020/2024), Paragraph 162</a>:
<ol>“We recognize that divorce may become a regrettable but necessary alternative when marital relationships are strained beyond repair or become destructive or when spouses become irrevocably estranged. In such instances, we advise married couples to seek appropriate counseling and, if divorce proceedings become unavoidable, to conduct them in a manner that minimizes detrimental impacts on all family members.
Fidelity to the marriage covenant does not require spouses to remain in a physically or mentally abusive relationship. We do not support efforts to withhold the church’s ministries from divorced people or to deny them opportunities for leadership in the church, whether clergy or lay. We urge pastors and congregations to provide ministries and programs that support divorced people in overcoming social and religious stigmas that they too often face. Divorce does not preclude remarriage.” </ol>
Prior to joining the United Methodist Church, this blogger wrote the following <a href="https://www.angelfire.com/ok3/dwr/Divorce.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">commentary about divorce and remarriage among Christians</a>:
<ol>
“One of the most spiritually gut-wrenching events that a Christian can go through is a divorce. Even after a divorce is legally finalized, its sting can last a lifetime.
To make matters worse, it is not unusual for well-meaning Christians to add to the sting by giving alleged “biblical” counsel that condemns, as opposed to giving counsel that heals.
Christians who have undergone a divorce don’t need others to speak words of condemnation, because Christians who have undergone divorce often condemn themselves.
They do so whenever they compare themselves to the elderly married couple who have been married fifty years or more and who are in church every Sunday morning.
Divorced Christians condemn themselves when they read Bible verses about divorce but overlook the cultural context of those verses.
Sadly, preachers may also overlook the cultural context of those verses when preaching about divorce, thus adding to the emotional pain that divorced Christians experience.
I do not write about divorce as a preacher or as a professional counselor. Instead, I write about divorce as a Christian who has underwent and survived divorce. I write as someone who has been on the receiving end of bad counsel from preachers. I write as someone who has witnessed the pain that other divorced Christians experience.
It is not easy for me to write about this topic, but I do so with the hope of helping Christians who have been through divorce.
What I have come to believe about this topic is influenced by what the Bible says in Micah 6:8. In the JPS Tanakh, that verse says, “It hath been told thee, O man, what is good, and what the Lord doth require of thee: only to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.”
When talking about divorce, Jesus promoted justice and mercy, and he did so within the context of the ancient Jewish society. He was well aware that Jewish men had the bad habit of divorcing their wives for unjust reasons, and he was well aware that people could be socially condemned for getting divorced for a just reason.
In Matthew 5:32, Jesus says, “I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
In Matthew 19:9, Jesus says, “I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”
Was Jesus turning a blind eye toward people who are physically abused by their spouses? Was he without mercy for people who have been abandoned by their spouses or who have been harmed by their spouses in ways that threaten their survival?
No, I do not believe so. God is just and merciful. It would be out of his character to require people to remain victims of abusive relationships that serve no purpose for his kingdom.
When one reads Matthew 5:32 and Matthew 19:9, one sees the mercy that Jesus has for people who have been sinned against by their spouses. In those verses, Jesus clearly permits divorce for victims of sexual sin. Nowhere does the Bible speak against the victims of such sin becoming remarried after a divorce.
It is true that Jesus did not mention victims of abusive spouses, but to focus on a strict word-for-word interpretation of his words would be to miss the forest for the trees. Again, Jesus promoted justice and mercy. There is no justice and mercy in telling victims of abusive spouses that they cannot get divorced, or, if they are divorced, that they can never remarry. One can infer from the teachings of Jesus that victims of abusive spouses are under the same umbrella as victims of sexual sin.
Even if a Christian has just cause to get divorced, that Christian can still bear the pain of a shattered dream about marriage. We Christians can fool ourselves into thinking that, if only we had done this and that, then we wouldn’t have gone through divorce.
I wish that such were true, but it isn’t reality. That is because one cannot control what one’s spouse says or does. We Christians can do our best with the help of the Holy Spirit and still end up divorced. We only harm ourselves by comparing ourselves to an ideal that wasn’t realistic in the first place.
Yes, marriage can work between two Christians who are being led by the Holy Spirit and who give their relationship to God priority over their relationship to each other. That is why one can find in churches married couples who have been married for fifty years or longer.
Yet, it is wrong and harmful for divorced Christians to belittle themselves because their own marriages didn’t last “until death do us part”. If divorced Christians are divorced because of sin on their part, then they have this assurance from 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
Divorce isn’t the unforgivable sin, and neither is remarriage.
Sadly, it isn’t unusual for divorced Christians to be re-victimized by people who take Bible verses out of cultural context, with some of those people being preachers or church elders.
As I see it, pastors should acknowledge that divorced Christians have been harmed by bad counsel coming from certain preachers. All too often, divorced Christians will stop attending church altogether because of how they have been treated by preachers or other church leaders. This is especially true when the divorced Christians were victims of sexual sin or abusive spouses.
Such Christians need the healing ministry of a local church, but they won’t get that healing if ministers don’t acknowledge all sources of those Christians’ pain, including the pain inflicted by bad preachers or bad elders.
I have encountered way too many Christians who have been too scared to set foot in a church because they expect to be condemned for being divorced, even when they got divorced because of an adulterous or physically-abusive spouse.
I felt that way after my divorce. While sitting through a church service, I would look at the 2-inch (5-centimeter) scar on my left arm that my ex-wife gave to me, and I would wonder if I was condemned to a life of singleness. I am certain that other divorced Christians have felt condemned, too.
Well, I have good news of divorced Christians. They are not condemned. In Romans 8:1, the Apostle Paul writes, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
God bestows his mercy on divorced Christians as much as he does on non-divorced Christians. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, divorced Christians can recover from divorce, and they can have another marriage, one that is pleasing to God.*
God works to restore the broken lives of all his children. That includes his divorced children.”</ol>
<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg" alt="" width="800" height="17" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-270586" srcset="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg 800w, https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line-300x6.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px" />
*I am not saying that every divorced Christian will find another spouse, but that a divorced Christian can find another spouse. In my case, I met my late wife after my divorce. At the time that I met her, I was involved in a church that had a godly approach to divorce and remarriage.
<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg" alt="" width="800" height="17" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-270586" srcset="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg 800w, https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line-300x6.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px" />
The preceeding blog post has not been endorsed by the United Methodist Church.
<img loading="lazy" src="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg" alt="" width="800" height="17" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-270586" srcset="https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line.jpg 800w, https://themoderatevoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dividing-Line-300x6.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px" />
<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alfred_Le_Petit_-_Alfred_Naquet,_l%27ange_du_divorce.jpg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">This blog post’s Featured Image is in the Public Domain.</a>

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