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The World and Everything In It
1.14.26 The politics of gender and abortion, Iran’s widening protests and collapsing economy, and preaching across languages in Uganda
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Good morning. The Supreme Court hears a case that could determine the future of sports for girls and women. The question is whether the application of law turns on transgender status. And it doesn't. It turns on sex. We had reporters at the court. And this morning we have analysis by Hunter Baker on Washington Wednesday. Also today, world tour, what's driving young Iranians to demand new government? And lost in translation. I'm just a noisy symbol. It doesn't make any sense. Faithful interpreters helped to make the message meaningful. And Cal Thomas on the rush to judgment. It's Wednesday, January 14th. This is the world and everything in it from listener Supported World Radio. I'm Lindsay Mast. And I'm Nick Eicher. Good morning. Up next, Kit Covington has today's news. President Trump is calling on Tehran to show protesters humanity amid reports of a deadly crackdown on demonstrators. Trump says he has canceled plans with Iranian officials and told protesters that, quote, help is on the way, without explaining what that means to all Iranian patriots. Keep protesting. Take over your institutions if possible, and save the name of the killers and the abusers that are abusing you. You're being very badly abused. Trump said he was reviewing information about the extent of violence against protesters by Iran's government, calling it significant. And he said he was reviewing next steps with his national security team. The president says right now the US Is weighing diplomatic and economic options and has warned Iran against further violence. The message is they've got to show humanity. They've got a big problem and I hope they're not going to be killing people. And human rights groups say more than 2,000 people may have been killed and more than 16,000 arrested since protests began late last month, but those numbers cannot be independently verified. The U.S. supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in two cases that could determine whether states can protect female athletes from having to compete against men and boys who identify as female. At issue is whether laws in Idaho and West Virginia are discriminating based on sex as they prohibit biologically male athletes from competing in women's sports. West Virginia Attorney General J.B. mcCuskey told reporters, we believe we're right on the facts. We know we're right on the Constitution and we know we're right on the law. But most importantly, we're right on common sense. These laws make sense. They protect our women and girls and we. Lower courts struck down the bans, claiming they violate Title 9 and Equal Protection. But there was no indication Tuesday that the high court plans to follow suit. A decision is expected by the early summer after Tuesday's hearing. Kristen Wagoner with Alliance Defending Freedom lamented the voices that were not heard in the courtroom. What you didn't hear enough of today in the courtroom were the real women that are hurt by this. Where are those women showing up in this hearing? We'll have more on this later in the program. New numbers from the Labor Department show inflation holding steady in the month of December, largely beating expectations. Consumer prices rose 0.3% last month, the same pace as November, while core inflation, which strips out volatile sectors like food and energy, ticked up 2/10 of 1%. Inflation now stands at 2.7% as compared to a year ago. That is well below the peak seen in 2022, but it remains stubbornly higher than the Federal Reserve's 2% target. 2025 proved to be the deadliest year for civilians in Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion nearly four years ago. As attacks continue, World's Kristen Flavin reports. A new UN report states that more than 2,500 civilians were killed last year, many of them far from the front lines. More than 12,000 others were wounded. That's according to the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine. Officials say Ukrainian casualties were up more than 30% from the year before. The report says the increase was driven in part by Moscow's expanded use of long range weapons. Meanwhile, authorities say four people died and six more were injured after the Russian military attacked a postal terminal in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv. First responders rescued 30 people from the ruins of the building. For World, I'm Kristin Flavin. Former President Bill Clinton is refusing to testify before the House Oversight Committee and its probe related to the Jeffrey Epstein files. And that is setting up a possible contempt of Congress fight. Clinton fired off a letter to Chairman James Comer. In it, he accused the committee of selectively enforcing subpoenas and said two law firms reviewed the request and found it legally invalid. For his part, Comer told reporters that the committee only wants answers. So no one's accusing Bill Clinton of any wrongdoing. We just have questions. And that's why the Democrats voted, along with Republicans to subpoena Bill Clinton. Comer noted flight records show Clinton traveled on Epstein's plane at least 27 times. Republican Congressman Tim Burchett says the committee is now preparing contempt proceedings. Civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin has died at the age of 86. Colvin was just 15 years old when she refused to give up her seat on a segregated Montgomery bus in March of 1955 in Alabama. Police arrested her months before Rosa Parks made a similar stand, drawing national attention. Her arrest came as anger was building over segregation on city buses. That momentum led to the Montgomery bus boycott, which helped launch the national civil rights movement. Colvin's record was cleared in 2021. I'm Kent Covington. And straight ahead, much more on that Supreme Court case that could determine the future of sports for girls and women. Plus WORLD tour. This is the World and everything in It. It's Wednesday, the 14th of January. Glad to have you along for today's edition of THE World and Everything in It. Good morning. I'm Nick Iker. And I'm Lindsay Mast. Time now for Washington Wednesday. The Supreme Court yesterday heard oral arguments in two cases involving whether men should be allowed to compete in women's sports. The decision will affect millions of female athletes. World had reporters inside and outside the court and we will break down the oral argument Monday morning on legal docket. But today, the issues for everyday Americans, girls and young women who want fair competition, safety and privacy balanced against those who would have the law treat gender identity as sex. Here is World's Juliana Chan Erickson. That girl's basketball team is ranked number one in the state of West Virginia. While the Supreme Court justices debated the issue, inside, supporters from both sides were jockeying for space on the steps of the court. Trans girls are a part of human rights. On the left side, about 200 people gathered to support the male athletes who want to play on female teams. Here's Stephanie Vader, a Methodist minister. What brings me here is that I think all human beings should have access to the things that bring them joy. And I know for many people who are athletes that playing sports brings them great joy. Another advocate said this case could extend far beyond who can play on sports teams. Depending on how they decide, it could affect anything under title IX and 14th amendment, whether that protects trans people at all. On the other side, another few hundred people rallied to defend a sex based definition of women's sports. My daughter plays competitive lacrosse as well as a competitive swimmer and I think that she should be able to compete fairly and safely in any sport that she chooses to compete in. Kit Hart's daughter is 14. Hart compares sex based categories for sports to age based categories. An eight year old is never going to be able to compete with a 14 year old for obvious biological reasons, and that's the same as sex. Currently, 29 states have laws or agency rules requiring student athletes to play with the team corresponding to the sex on their birth certificate. The other 21 states and the District of Columbia allow athletes to play on teams according to their self prescribed gender identity. There's a reason why there are separate sports to begin with, because there wouldn't be separate sports if there wasn't a difference. Peyton McNabb played volleyball in high school until she went up against a biological male playing for an opposing team in 2022. That spiked ball left McNabb with multiple head injuries, ending her high school volleyball career and derailing plans to play softball in college. She's since recovered physically and now works to protect women's sports and private spaces. We've worked so hard to get these bills across and these girls feel so relieved that they're protected in their home. And now like the court's gonna roll on, if that's even allowed. If what's been promised all along, which is protection and equal opportunity and a trust in your system is actually gonna protect Reporting for World I'm Juliana Chan Erickson in Washington. Joining us to talk about it now is political scientist Hunter Baker. He is a World Opinions contributor and provost at North Greenville University. Good morning, Hunter. Good morning, Hunter. We will have a good deal of coverage of this over the coming days. So I want to focus with you on the politics of this. This seems like a winning issue. Some two thirds of Americans have said they support sports organizations relying on sex, not gender ident for athletics. So will this be something candidates will focus on in the midterms? What will the ramifications of this decision be come November? I think there's a real question as to how current this issue is with the voters. Certainly there was a period there where I think voters had a lot of concern about it and where you saw it in electoral results. But then we look back at something like winsome Sears gubernatorial run in Virginia, and she really did emphasize it. I would say she made that the cornerstone of her run and it really didn't do her much good. Now, what I would say about this is, is that if the court delivers kind of an expected result, just reinforcing the idea that we are going to stick to biological sex and things like athletic competition, then I don't think that that will have much effect. But if the court were to come back with an unexpected result that sort of got everybody excited in a. In a bad way again, you know, that people became concerned about this issue coming back to the fore, then that probably would have some political payoff, especially for the Republicans. Well, Hunter, I think it's pretty clear. This issue of no men in women's sports is highly popular with many voters and I believe that team sees it that way, too. What they don't see that way is the pro life issue. They see it as a political liability. They may be right, they may be wrong, but that's how they see it. So here's what I think the political calculus may be here. Those who are opposed to gender ideology and those who are opposed to abortion, they are basically the same voter bloc. And I think Team Trump may be prioritizing the popular social conservative issue over the unpopular one. So just purely a political consideration, whether they are right or whether they are wrong, I think that's what's happened here. What do you say about that? I think that that's definitely a concern both with Donald Trump and maybe, maybe to some extent with the Republican Party. I think that what conservatives think is that the transgender issue is Basically, say, a 65, 70% issue in their favor, and the other side is to some extent trapped supporting an unpopular position. So you tend to want to try to just push that over and over again to try to gain that advantage because it's working for you. Republicans and Trump, I think that they see the pro life issue differently than the transgender issue. You know, obviously we had Dobbs overturning Roe v. Wade, and that was just the beginning. Right. All that did was to really open the abortion issue up to the Democratic consideration of the American people. And so it really should not be surprising that you lose some of those battles, maybe many of those battles up front, because you've really got to go all the way back to the beginning of trying to litigate this issue with the public. And so I think a lot of Republicans, certainly Trump, Trump who has his sort of his political instincts, he looks at it, he says, okay, I gave it back to the states. And Republicans, pro lifers, are losing a lot of those races. And he doesn't want to put his capital behind that. And so he wants to say, I did what I said I'd do, and now I'm kind of out of it. Well, shifting gears, Hunter, I want to talk to you about a remarkable escalation in the president's feud with the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jay Powell. For Powell's part, he has largely tried to stay above the fray, but now he's got the Justice Department having opened a criminal investigation into him over cost overruns related to the renovation of the Fed's headquarters. Now Powell is firing back in unusually blunt terms for him. Here is Powell in a video posted this week. The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest Rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President. This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions, or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation. Well, what do you think about this, Hunter? Is Powell right to frame this as a fight over Federal Reserve independence, or might he be resisting legitimate oversight? I've paid a lot of attention to Jay Powell during his time as the head of the Federal Reserve, and in a lot of ways I think that he has been very admirable. He has very strongly resisted the temptation to get involved in politics, even when he was baited. Very much an honest broker. I think that the media would often try to get some sort of negative comment from him on Trump, and he would basically say, I won't have a comment of that type for you. So he was. He was very good about that. And I think that he would acknowledge in a very tempered way when Trump was doing something. Well, I noted in that first term, one of the things that you saw was that people at the bottom of the economic scale seemed to be benefiting, that they were having improvements in wages and income. And so Powell was there to say that and to kind of give credit where credit was due. Now, what has happened since is there have been some missteps, and there have been some things that are questionable in terms of missteps. Powell and the Federal Reserve poured way too much money into the bucket trying to fight against the COVID problem, you know, trying to keep our economy going. And we saw kind of the way we overshot with inflation toward the end. So I think that they kept the pump prime too long. And so there's a reaction to that. The other thing is, is that in the run up to the election, the last presidential election, they cut rates that wasn't necessarily expected that they would cut rates. And sometimes that looks like you're trying to prime the economic pump for the party that is in office. So that was somewhat questionable. But do I think that Trump has really been. Do I think that he's pressuring him too much? I would say so. I think that it's important for the Federal Reserve to be independent. You know, we look back to another example of Richard Nixon pressing Federal Reserve Chair Arthur Burns, and I think that that was not good, and I think it's not good here. Well, Hunter, another major flashpoint this week is Greenland. What began years ago as a strategic thought experiment has escalated into a full blown international standoff. The President is again declaring that the states must control Greenland to counter the Russians and the Chinese in the Arctic. But both Denmark and Greenland have firmly rejected any notion of a US Takeover. Danish leaders are warning that a US Military move against Greenland would risk shattering the NATO alliance. So against that backdrop, the former UK Ambassador to the United States, Lord Peter Mandelson, told the BBC, this is not likely to end with force. We are all going to have to wake up to the reality that the Arctic needs securing against China and Russia. And if you ask me who is going to lead in that effort to secure, we all know, don't we, that it's going to be the United States. Unless we in Europe, unless we in Britain are prepared to stump up the forces and the radars and the anti missile systems and the air defense systems to protect Greenland and the Arctic. Are we? No, we're not. And that's why we, at the end of the day, going to be dependent on the United States to do so. So, Hunter, let's strip away this Saturday morning cartoon version of the President's rhetoric. Comments about dog sleds and the like, and the strategic stakes here do seem quite real. Do you see this as Lord Mandelson does a serious national security priority dressed up in undisciplined language or as a dangerous escalation that risks turning a legitimate concern into a geopolitical crisis? Oh, I'm, I'm sure that it's serious. I'm sure that Greenland matters from a national defense perspective, and I'm also sure that it matters in terms of potential natural resources and minerals and things of that nature. When it comes to Trump, we have to read him, we have to figure out when is he being serious and when is he going farther than anyone else will go in order to set up the most advantageous bargaining table? I think that he may be doing that here. I just don't think that he's playing the part of the Athenians against the Melians in the Melian dialogue, where it's basically saying the strong do what they will, the weak suffer what they must. I don't think he's quite going there, but I do think that he is waving the big stick and what he wants is maximum accommodation when it comes to what the partnership is going to look like in terms of setting up the defense. Well, Hunter, I want to go back to Lord Mandelson's warning that the west needs to wake up to Arctic security realities. What if we don't? If the US and its allies simply try to avoid the discomfort, avoid the confrontation, avoid the hard conversations. What are the real consequences of sleeping through this moment? Who fills the vacuum in the Arctic if the United States decides this is too politically or diplomatically messy to lead? I mean, the worry is, is that you end up with, with Russia, maybe, maybe Russia enabled by China in some way. And yes, that is frightening. It is concerning. And I think that part of why this area is important is because of potential missile defense kind of concerns. So, no, we can't ignore it. But I think that Trump should recognize that the Danes are probably pretty good partners here. And I think that they are gonna be willing to work with him. And I think that we're gonna do something together. I think that's where we're gonna go. Well, Hunter, before we go, Scott Adams died yesterday. He was just 68 years old. He was a major cultural figure from the 90s and early aughts. He was creator of the comic strip Dilbert. For more than 30 years. That comic strip skewered corporate life and became a fixture in newspapers worldwide. But Adams's career collapsed in 2023 after some racially charged comments on his podcast led publishers to cut ties. Adams would describe this as his being canceled, not just criticized, but take a step back and assess the legacy of Scott Adams, both the cult impact of Dilbert and Scott Adams involvement in politics. So first of all, I just want to say that his comic strip came along at just the right time for me when I was beginning a corporate career. And I just have to say that he made corporate existence a lot more fun for many of us. And certainly I had some of those comics posted in my cubicle. He wrote some really interesting books, sort of offering people ideas about success. I think that several of those were huge sellers. But in 2016, he started to get involved in politics and he got involved. You know, he kept claiming that he was a Hillary Clinton supporter, which he later said that was to protect himself, while simultaneously pointing out the unusual effectiveness of Donald Trump. I think that he's the one who came up with the phrase linguistic kill shot to describe some of the very effective remarks that Trump would make and the way he would label some of his enemies. So I think that he lost some of his mainstream support as he waded into politics, but boy, he sure was interesting for a lot of us there for many years. Hunter Baker is a political scientist and commentator for World Opinions. Thank you so much, Hunter. Thank you. Additional support comes from Rich Haven Camp in North Carolina and Iowa Summer camp Registration open now@richhaven.org from Ambassadors Impact Network, where investors collaborate on due diligence to fund faith based companies and venture funds. Ambassadorsimpact.com and from his Words Abiding in you A podcast to help the body of Christ memorize the words of Christ. His Words Abiding in you. Available on all podcast apps. Coming up next on the World and everything in it Iran's ongoing Operation Uprising Protesters are still out on the streets across Iranian provinces and despite the Islamic Republic's heavy handed crackdown, protesters remain defiant for this week's world tour. Oniza Dua reports on what's driving the unrest. Late last month, protesters began gathering on the streets of Iran, chanting antiquated government slogans and calling for the ouster of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The protests began on December 28 after shopkeepers in Tehran shut their doors to protest the falling currency. The prices of staples like meat and rice have also skyrocketed. The protests have now grown into a major challenge to Iran's leadership. More than 600 protesters have died, with more than 10,000 in detention. On Tuesday, one human rights group said the numbers are much higher. The protests come after a turbulent year for many Iranians. Of course there were water scarcity issues, there were power outages. Janatan Saya is a research analyst at the foundation for Defense of Democracies. He offered policy analysis on the show yesterday and went on to talk with me about the background leading up to the protests on the human rights front. This year we saw the highest number of executions of Iranians by the Islamic Republic. And once you couple all that together and paired with the fact that the average Iranian doesn't have the purchase power to put bread on the table, it was really a turning point. And this is really a movement that has gone beyond just a protest wave and it's more so resembling a revolution. Many protesters are from Iran's youthful population looking to break away from the order of the Islamic establishment. You're talking about a population that's over educated, underemployed, meaning most people do have college degrees, but they don't. They're not able to get jobs because of how the economy is functioning. You're talking about a population also that is increasingly looking at the west, even though the flow of information to Iran is restricted. Nonetheless, Iranians really thrive to have the freedoms that they see in Europe, they see in America. Iranian authorities have responded to the chants of Death to the dictator by shutting down the Internet and blocking international phone calls. Iranian authorities have warned that anyone joining the protests will be tried as an enemy of God, a charge that could draw the death penalty. Tens of thousands of pro government protesters also crowded the streets of Tehran on Monday in a government organized demonstration. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump has threatened direct action against Iran, ranging from economic sanctions to direct strikes if Iran fails to negotiate. Mohamed Baga Galibaf is an Iranian parliament speaker. He threatened to teach Americans an unforgettable lesson if the US Attacks. Iran has also blamed the United States and Israel for stoking the protests. But Saya says there's room for countries like the US to support the protesters, so it is simply enabling protesters to maintain this, and that could be done through cyber engagement, cyber attacks against the regime, creating a strike fund, allowing laborers and business owners to maintain their strikes. More importantly, it would be attacks on the repression apparatus. For many Iranians out on the streets, the movement goes beyond protests to seeing the collapse of the Islamic Republic. Some are calling for a return to the monarchy led by Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran's deposed shah. What sets this wave apart from previous ones is the fact that Iranians are not only aligned on what they want to see with the collapse of the regime, but more importantly, they know what they want to see after that, which is the return of the monarchy led by Crown Prince Pahlavi, at least in a transitional phase that would allow them to hold elections months down the road. Reporting for World I'm Onizi Odua. It was a whole lot of business up front. Party in the back at the Pennsylvania Farm Show's annual mullet competition. The term referring to hair cut short on the front and sides but left longer in the back. A lot longer. The contest included an under 5 category for kids that may be small in stature but big in style. Clearly the hairs apparent mom did not want to cut the curls. So this mullet is two years in the making. Yeah. So you're getting the idea. What makes for a mullet that's a cut above. It begins with length, of course. A big factor. The audio from WGAL tv. We love the style, your flare. Do you have accessories? Your presentation, this year's best in show mullet, a 10 year old. His costume inspired by the movie Joe Dirt. He bested 150 other competitors so you could call him the main attraction and spell that two different ways and still be correct. It's the world and everything in it. Today is Wednesday, January 14th. Thank you for turning to World Radio to help start your day. Good morning, I'm Nick Iger and I'M Lindsay Mast. Coming next on the World and everything in it. Pulpit partners. If you've ever visited a country where English is not the dominant language, you know the importance of a good interpreter, especially when you have an urgent message. World's Myrna Brown has the story from Uganda. With a firm grip around his Bible, Brian Pippin meets Elijah Sepuya at the front of the church. They're both mic'd and ready. Once behind the wooden podium, Pippin seats the congregation and the tag team preaching begins. I don't know what God is doing in your Life right now. 61 year old Pippin says he can't imagine being in a foreign country without someone like Sepuya by his side. This relationship is really about God putting the message in one person's heart and having it come out the mouth of another person. And that's quite an affair. But when it works, there's nothing like it. It feels great. It's the only time I get to do preaching as a team sport. 37 year old Sepuya says game on. He's been waiting more than half his life for this day. I first saw Pastor Brian, he came here with a team and they brought a very wonderful conference then. That was in 2008. Sepuya was in his early 20s, a new believer who had recently left the Muslim faith and barely escaped with his life. Because in Muslims they say we murdered you, left our religion, we have to kill you. Safe and free of Islam. Sepulia was still unsure of how God would use him until he heard Pippin preach a sermon on Nehemiah. He heard about the Jewish exiles rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. That's when I realized that all these challenges that I've been going through, they are not compared to what these people went through as long as you have a vision. So my life was put on a foundation. That's when Sepuya began serving this church as an interpreter. English is the official language in Uganda, but many in this congregation still speak Luganda, the most widely spoken indigenous language. Sepuya is fluent in both and is training other young men to follow in his footsteps. But today he gets to serve alongside the man who, who planted the seed all those years ago. I am reminded that without them in a foreign culture, I'm a clanging gong, you know, just a noisy symbol. It doesn't make any sense. The interpreter has the assignment of taking a message from another tongue and communicating it with the same depth and the same passion. You have to be better than I am at what I do to be able to do what I do in another language. So what makes a good interpreter? Sepulia says it's not about education. It's a gift. Maybe so also is a calling. But usually good interpreters are good pastors, good preachers. So a good interpreter has to be a good prayer person, too. So I have to prepare before God and pray that there will be a flow because I'm going to be using my mind very quick. I did not prepare the message. I don't know what Pastor Brian is going to talk about, but yet I have to do it in an instant. Back in the pulpit, Pippin moves from one side of the podium to the other, gesturing with his hands to make his points. Sepulia follows him, matching Pippin's rhythm, His pacing and his timing. You know, in the first two minutes, if they're with you, you know how fast you can go, you know, if they're going to be able to understand, if they're struggling to find the words, that tells me I need to simplify my language. Because not every word in English has an equivalent in their language. And not all western conventions are transferable. Take alliteration, for instance, that you start every point with the same letter that doesn't translate. You can't use humor because by the time you say it and then they interpret it, it's just lost. And then there are the cultural differences. The African culture in the way we speak is a little bit animated, but also we speak in figures, we speak in. In idioms. We are a little bit louder here. We love loud stuff to jump, scream, shout. Now, when it comes to Pastor Brian here, he's soft a little bit, so. But those differences are minor compared to what the two men have in common. Their mission of sharing the gospel to the people here. When I am discouraged, I love to read the psalms from King David reporting for World Amyrna Brown in Koepe, uganda. In Psalm 42, David says, why am I so discouraged? Good morning. This is the world and everything in it. From listener supported World Radio, I'm Lindsay Mast. And I'm Nick Iker. In Minneapolis, a fatal shooting during an ICE operation has become a major flashpoint on immigration enforcement across the country. World's Cal Thomas reflects now on the consequences when public opinion races ahead of the facts. I say, go get yourself some lunch, big boy. Go ahead. In Minneapolis, a woman named Renee Goode was shot at, killed during an ICE operation. Within hours and before the investigation had begun, let alone ended, city and state leaders were assigning blame. This was an agent recklessly using power that resulted in somebody dying, getting killed. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Fry and Minnesota governor Tim Walz called the shooting unnecessary. They faulted federal agents based largely on early video clips circulating online. But early video rarely tells the whole story. Authorities say Good was attempting to flee the scene in her vehicle. Federal officials say an agent was struck. Those facts matter, but they're largely absent from the first wave of public reaction. How many more Rodney Kings does it have to be? We've seen this pattern before, gestures of different ages and races demanding answers. In the shooting death of 18 year old Michael Brown at the hands of a police, a video appears the videotape beating of Rodney King. It left many Los Angeles residents outraged. Conclusions harden long before investigators have time to determine what actually happened. A similar rush played out recently in Portland, Oregon. There, a Customs and Border Protection agent opened fire during a traffic stop involving suspects that even local authorities had to admit reluctantly were members of a violent Venezuelan gang. And what I can say is there is an association with the two folks yesterday and tda. I hesitated to even share this information initially because I'm very aware of the historic injustice of victim blaming. The Department of Homeland Security said the suspects had weaponized their vehicle while trying to escape. In both cases, the public debate moved faster than the facts. Investigations take time. They always have. But we live in an age that rewards instant narrative, especially when those narratives serve political purposes. That has consequences. Federal officials say ICE and Border Patrol agents now face heightened threats during routine enforcement operations. Agents report being harassed, pelted with objects and targeted for identification and doxing. This is not simply about immigration policy. It's about whether legitimate authority can function at all. There are two ways to undermine the law. One is by breaking it outright. The other is by refusing to enforce it. The latter defined much of the previous administration's approach to border security, and it allowed violent criminals to enter the country and remain in the country. That history helps explain why today's enforcement actions are so contentious, but it does not excuse replacing due process with instant verdicts. A society that treats law enforcement as the enemy should not be surprised when disorder follows. In Minneapolis, Portland and other cities, federal agents are attempting to arrest and deport people charged with serious crimes. Instead of allowing investigations to run their course, trained demonstrators rush to the streets and officers become the targets. CS Lewis said. For what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you're standing and on what sort of person you are. He was right. But truth still exists. And if we abandon patience, evidence and lawful process in favor of instant outrage, we should not be surprised when the rule of law itself becomes the casualty. For World, I'm Cal Thomas. Tomorrow, the British House of Lords takes up assisted suicide. We'll have a report from the UK and new dietary guidelines. Stir up a food fight. That and more tomorrow. I'm Lindsay Mac. And I'm Nick Eicher. The world and everything in it comes to you from World Radio. World's mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates and inspires. The Bible says that when Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him, lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly. And he said to him, I will come and heal him. But the centurion replied, lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. But only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. And I say to one, go, and he goes, and to another, come, and he comes, and to my servant do this. And he does it. When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such Faith. Matthew, chapter 8, verses 5 to 10. Go now in grace and peace.