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Perhaps no member of Congress has personally experienced the dangers of the divisions wracking the United States and Congress as much as Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky.

He saw the shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise and helped administer care to the gravely wounded congressman. He was later tackled by an angry next-door neighbor while mowing his lawn, suffering broken ribs, removal of a portion of his lung, and a resultant infection damage which, remarkably, did not appear to compound a COVID 19 infection. Finally, last fall, Paul and his wife Kelley were attacked by protesters after leaving a White House meeting.

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In a sit-down interview with the Washington Examiner's Doug McKelway, Paul reflected on the causes of our national and congressional impasse, the intra-party divisions in the post-Trump GOP, and the risks to the First Amendment as some members of Congress question cable and streaming services about canceling conservative networks and news providers.

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Rand Paul on the future of the GOP: Exclusive - Washington Examiner

The Daily Beast

Bandar Algaloud/Courtesy of Saudi Royal Court/Handout via ReutersA criminal case against Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and others in the Saudi hierarchy has been filed in a German court for the brutal 2018 murder, dismemberment, and disappearance of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, despite the kingdoms denial of MBS direct involvement and the Biden administrations flaccid response to the killing.The 500-page complaint filed by the press-freedom group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is the first time a criminal case has been lodged outside of what was largely considered a show trial in Saudi Arabia. That trial saw the conviction of eight people who were later pardoned after members of the Khashoggi family were said to have forgiven them.Saudis Crown Prince Is a Killer. So Why Is Biden Just Shrugging?On Monday, the Saudi ambassador to the United Nations disputed a four-page CIA report released last week that pointed to MBS involvement, tweeting, Let us all move forward to tackle the serious business of world issues!!Ambassador Abdallah Al-Mouallimi called the American report, which has been widely criticized as weak, as being based on couldve, shouldve and wouldve and does not rise to anywhere close to proving the accusation beyond reasonable doubt.The report, which was held back by the Trump administration and released last week by Biden, does not directly accuse MBS of ordering the hit on Khashoggi but does say he had absolute control over all activities carried out by the kingdoms intelligence service. Al-Mouallimi argued in a Twitter tirade that the Prince courageously accepted moral responsibility, presented the accused to the justice system, and pledged to reform the intelligence organizations. Case closed!Khashoggi was ambushed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul by a 15-member hit squad that includes a bone-saw-wielding surgeon and seven members of MBS elite personal security team in October 2018. The journalists body has never been found.The complaint in Germany was filed Monday with public prosecutors in the city of Karlsruhe, according to an RSF statement. The dossier outlines the arbitrary detention of 34 journalists and the brutal murder of Khashoggi to underscore what it calls the kingdoms widespread and systematic persecution of the press.These journalists are the victims of unlawful killing, torture, sexual violence, and coercion and forced disappearance, Christophe Deloire, RSF secretary-general, said at a press conference Tuesday morning. Those responsible for the persecution of journalists in Saudi Arabia, including the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, must be held accountable for their crimes.The RSF statement names MBS and four other suspects: Saud Al-Qahtani, a close adviser to the crown prince who they allege took direct part in the planning and execution of the murder as well as in the implementation of the policy of persecution of journalists in Saudi Arabia; Ahmad Mohammed Asiri, the former deputy head of intelligence, who is suspected of personally supervising Khashoggis murder; Mohammad Al-Otaibi, the consul general in Istanbul at the time of the murder; and Maher Abdulaziz Mutreb, an intelligence officer who led the team that tortured, killed, and forceably disappeared Jamal Khashoggi.The complaint was filed in Germany because laws there can extend universal jurisdiction to some serious international crimes, even when the victims are not German. The case is bolstered by the recent conviction in a German court of a Syrian secret-service officer for aiding and abetting crimes against humanity for the torture of protesters at one of Bashar al-Assads prisons, according to The Guardian.The official opening of a criminal investigation in Germany into the crimes against humanity in Saudi Arabia would be a world first, RSFs Germany director Christian Mihr said. We ask the public prosecutor general to open a situation analysis, with a view to formally launching a prosecutorial investigation and issuing arrest warrants.RSF ranks Saudi Arabia 170th out of 180 countries in its press-freedom index. Saudi Arabia permits no independent media, the RSF rationale states. Despite his talk of reform, Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) has intensified the repression since his appointment as crown prince in June 2017. The number of journalists and citizen-journalists in detention has tripled since the start of 2017.The German court has not yet accepted the claim and no court date has been set.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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Rand Paul presses Biden nominee over views on giving minors hormone therapy - Yahoo News

If you say something even vaguely critical, or something that is even perceived as critical of the move to allow boys and girls to transition from one gender to the next, you run the risk of being suspended from social media, fired from your job or shunned by your friends. That can even happen if you are a respected United States senator at the confirmation hearing of a deputy secretary of health. Well get to that in a minute, so hold that thought.

I sometimes make jokes about the fact that people are now using personal pronouns in the way prior generations used hair color, tattoos and love beads: An effort to express ones identity. Th people who usually laugh at the jokes are the ones who understand that playing around with grammar to make yourself feel better about whoever it is you think you are is rather ridiculous. The ones who dont laugh are the kind of people who think that (1) a single person calling himself they is perfectly reasonable and (2) would absolutely let their adolescent daughter take hormones so she can become their adolescent son.

Have I been canceled yet? Are you still able to read this column? On the assumption that you can, lets move on to the respected U.S. senator.

Last week, Rand Paul questioned Pennsylvanias erstwhile Secretary of Health, Rachel Levine, about gender reassignment procedures for adolescents. We used to call it sex-change operation, but in this more enlightened age with experts who tell us that there are more than just two genders, we use the term gender reassignment. I suppose thats because we dont want to admit that anyone is really changing anything. Or, as some have said, God doesnt make mistakes, humans just mislabel.

Levine was appearing before a Senate committee on her nomination to be assistant health secretary in the Biden administration. Rand asked her a very pointed question about a fundamental trans issue, which is extremely fair since Biden has made a very big deal about nominating a trans woman for such an exalted federal office:

Do you believe that minors are capable of making such a life-changing decision as changing ones sex? Critics have pointed out that Sen. Paul used the wrong terminology since they would argue nothing is being changed, let alone sex. Remember, its gender, and its being reassigned. But even with that little clarification, there was no answer from Levine.

Then Paul asked, Do you support the governments intervening to override the parents consent to give a child puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and/or amputation surgery of breasts and genitals?

Again, Levine did not answer the question, other than to politely suggest that she would be more than willing to meet with the senator if and when she were confirmed, so they could hash these things out after the fact.

Of course, the whole point of a confirmation hearing is to determine whether someone is even qualified to be in a position to hash these sort of things out, and it is incumbent upon the senative to advise and give consent on any nomination that requires the confirmation.

Rand Paul was destroyed in the media because of his blunt comments. The legacy print media went after him as a bigot, and the LGBTQ (hard to keep up, am I missing a letter?) and their cis/straight/single-pronouned allies went ballistic. How dare he question whether a 13-year-old is qualified to make such momentous, permanent decisions about their bodies! How dare he suggest that a kid who isnt yet old enough to drive a car is, however, able to determine whether he wants his penis or her breasts removed, or whether they should take drugs to block the onset of natural puberty?

I mean, who does he think he is, a doctor? (Actually, yes, he is. But lets not let the facts get in the way.)

This was not Marjorie Taylor Greene getting into a dust up with her colleague in the House, the one who planted a rainbow flag outside of her office to support her trans daughter.

This was not some Facebook commentary about there only being two genders or a Twitter hashtag like #BelieveTheScience.

This was a medical doctor using his expertise to help inform his obligations as an elected public official. This was a senator, stating the case that so many of us believe to be the truth but who are prevented from making, namely, that allowing adolescents to make these decisions is tantamount to child abuse.

There are numerous cases of children who were allowed by their parents to choose their identities and then dealt with the devastating consequences later in life. One of them was profiled in a National Review article. Keira Bell was a 14-year-old who read about transsexuals on the internet, convinced her parents to let her have surgery, had her breasts removed, and now at the age of 23 deeply regrets the move. In the piece written by Madeleine Kearns, she says: I made a brash decision as a teenager, as a lot of teenagers do, trying to find confidence and happiness, except now the rest of my life will be negatively affected.

You might say that each case is different, and that we shouldnt judge how someone decides to deal with complicated identity questions. But society does that all the time, when it comes to kids. We make laws that protect them from themselves, and we even limit the authority of parents in order to safeguard the welfare of minors. We also have laws that absolve minors from criminal liability. We erect walls between what they want, and what they need.

We do it because kids are not equipped to make these decisions, no matter what the experts in this new boutique area of gender science might say.

Thats not bigotry, my friends. Thats common sense.

Its troubling that Dr. Levine cant admit it.

Christine Flowers is an attorney and a Delaware County resident. Her column appears Thursday and Sunday. Email her at cflowers1961@gmail.com.

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Christine Flowers: We have to protect children from themselves - The Delaware County Daily Times

Trans activists, like Bidens pick as assistant health secretary, Rachel Levine, say schoolkids can choose to have puberty blockers and sex-change surgery. But confused children are too young to make such life-changing decisions.

We all know the mantra by now trans women are women, and trans men are men. Deep down we may know it to be nonsense, but unless we pay it lip service we risk being labelled as bigots or worse despicable people who question the very humanity of trans people, to use the language of theNew York Times.

Victims of this ideology include women, whose boundaries and spaces are being violated by male people who claim to feel like women, and trans women like me who had been getting on with our lives. Nobody consulted with me before social justice warriors made us their cause clbre. Depicted falsely as one of the most vulnerable groups on the planet, many of us are relatively privileged, only transitioning after our male bodies helped us secure our places in society.

But the biggest casualties in my view are children. Confused young people, perhaps struggling with identity and nascent sexuality, are being told that if they are unhappy with their sex, then they can change it, with potentially disastrous consequences on their bodies. Nevertheless, this has become a major industry. The US Human Rights Campaignlists no fewer than 57 clinical care programs for gender-expansive children and adolescents in the United States and Canada alone. Puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and referrals for surgery are the go-to treatments.

Last week, Republican Senator Rand Paul decided he needed answers when Rachel Levine appeared before him. Levine is President Bidens nominee for assistant secretary of health and, like me, transitioned in mid-life after fathering children. One would expect, therefore, that Levine would be aware of the issues and dangers facing transgender-identifying children. Even so, Pauls question could not be clearer:

Dr. Levine, do you believe that minors are capable of making such a life changing decision as changing ones sex?

Levines attempt at obfuscation appeared to rely on a prepared text, Transgender medicine is a very complex and nuanced field, with robust research and standards of care that have been developed. After Paul explained his question, the exchange descended into farce when Levine again refused to answer and repeated word-for-word, Transgender medicine is a very complex and nuanced field... Paul was unimpressed at Levines reticence and noted, the witness refused to answer the question.

The video clip of the exchange encapsulates the dire state of what should be a serious political debate about the medicalisation of children:

Equally remarkable was Senator Patty Murrays response to the episode. Murray praised Levines thoughtful and medically informed responses, and even appeared to suggest that Levine had not been treated with respect.

In his questioning, Paul cited the case of Keira Bell, a British woman who had been prescribed hormone therapy as a teenager. Now aged 23, she regrets it. Recently, she brought a case to the High Court of England and Wales against her erstwhile clinic. She claimed that she had been too young to give consent. I am relieved that the courtagreed with her. Throughout childhood, I struggled with gender dysphoria and had gender affirming treatment been available to children in the 1980s I would have clamoured for it. But at best it is a palliative solution; had I taken it in my teens, I would never have had children of my own.

Following the Bell judgment, public health clinics in England and Wales can no longer prescribe puberty blocking drugs to children without the permission of a court, to protect young people from the folly of their own immaturity. But even so, children are not safe. Where there is money to be made, unscrupulous practitioners will look for openings.

On Saturday, we learned thatGender GP an online clinic working with children in the UK was prepared to use a legal loophole to supply testosterone, a class 3 controlled drug, to someone they thought was a 15-year-old girl. She was actually an undercover reporter at the Daily Telegraph. But Gender GP did not know that, having never actually met their patient, let alone examined them, and had never spoken to her parents.

Campaigning group forwomen.scot described it as a shocking dereliction of medical care.

Pictured in the featured image is Marianne Oakes, the lead counsellor at Gender GP, and a transwoman.Personaltestimony on the Gender GP website suggests that Oakes transitioned recently, having first been referred for treatment in September 2015, three months after qualifying as a therapeutic counsellor, with a view to realising my dream of working as a female therapist.

Oakes told the 15-year-old girl/Telegraph reporter that they did not require her parents permission. Staff accepted at face value the reporters stated belief that she was really male, telling her were not worried about your truth because theres no debate about that.

The Telegraph went on toreport that,

[The Prescription] was signed by a doctor in Romania, who the Telegraph has identified as a geriatrician also trained in administering Botox. GenderGP does not offer patients the chance of an appointment with her, even though she authorises the medication. Instead, they are directed to a doctor in Egypt, who told the reporter that it was excellent that, aged 15, she knew she never wanted to have children.

Appallingly, British children continue to access cross sex hormones, despite the Keira Bell judgment that they cannot even consent to puberty blockers.

Vulnerable children are being put at risk. The adults involved need to be called to account, transgender adults included. We may have first-hand experience of gender dysphoria, but we have no more idea than anyone else what it might feel like to be a member of the opposite sex. Nor can adult transitioners like Levine, Oakes or me, indeed ever really empathise with children who are being forced into life changing decisions about their future fertility before they know what it means to be an adult.

I never thought I would agree with a right-winger like Rand Paul. I started out as a socialist and I think I am still a socialist, but however wide the political gulf between us, it is transcended by something far more important the safeguarding of children.

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The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

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As a socialist and a trans woman, I never thought Id agree with Rand Paul. But on this issue of protecting children, hes right - RT

I know many liberals will disagree with me on this, but in 1988 there really was a liberal media. I found it very hard to get honest-to-God news that interested me as a conservative, even as a White House staffer. It had to be sought out in small-circulation magazines like Human Events and National Review or from the very few conservative columnists in major newspapers.

When the established media lost its gatekeeper function, it led to a vast proliferation of crackpot ideas that circulate unimpeded today.

I didn't need validation of my views, as was the case with many grassroots conservatives. I wanted intellectual ammunition I could use to design and promote conservative policies in government. Contrary to popular belief, the Reagan administration took analysis and research seriously.

Unlike the Trump White House, which often sent out documents with typos in them (a firing offense when I worked there), the policy development process in the Reagan White House was reasonably competent.

A key reason for making sure that there were proper analysis and documentation for administration proposals is that they would have been picked apart in the media otherwise. Not only was the American press generally skeptical of our philosophy, but it was exponentially more powerful in those days and could make or break a policy proposal very easily.

Frankly, I think Democrats on Capitol Hill, who controlled the House of Representatives during Reagan's entire eight-year term, tended to outsource their criticism of Republicans to The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Beat reporters for the major newspapers were gatekeepers, refusing to even mention any proposal or idea that was insufficiently worked out, lacked empirical data or academic support or just seemed stupid. Back when I worked for Jack Kemp, it took me years to get The Wall Street Journal tax reporter to mention Kemp's tax cut planeven after it had been endorsed by the Journal's editorial page.

Liberal Media Rules

And in those days before the internet, politicians were very heavily dependent on the mainstream media to get out their messages. About the only other way of doing so was direct mail. But printing and mailing newsletters was very expensive, and it took an enormous amount of effort to build a mailing list.

Like it or not, conservatives in the pre-talk radio, pre-Fox News, pre-internet era had to work through the liberal media and play by its rules.

Rules of the once-dominant mainstream media were mostly good. When the established media lost its gatekeeper function, it led to a vast proliferation of crackpot ideas that circulate unimpeded today. Even members of the prestige media have found themselves unable to keep nutty conspiracy theories from affecting their reporting as they document what is motivating Republican voters and politicians. But in reporting the existence of crackpot ideas and fake news, the mainstream media implicitly validates them and publicizes them.

When Limbaugh first went on the air, he was a breath of fresh air for conservativeseven those working in the White House. He was an essential source of news. As all of his listeners know, Limbaugh hoarded a "stack of stuff" consisting of news clippings, press releases, faxes and whatnot that caught his eye and formed the basis for his monologues.

He was as much a news consolidator and reviewer as he was a commentator in those days. And he frequently had an intelligent spin on the news, often picked up from the many politicians and policymakers he talked to off the air.

Master of Radio

Of course, Limbaugh was also a blowhard, and his massive hubris was off-putting. But it was part of his schtick and one of the reasons he was popular. Say whatever else you like about him, but Limbaugh was a masterful radio personality. He really understood and loved the medium. His foray into television just didn't suit his style and was soon abandoned.

As is well known, what made Limbaugh's breakthrough moment possible was the abandonment of the Fairness Doctrine by Reagan's Federal Communications Commission in 1987. Previously, the expression of political opinions on television or radio required that time be provided for differing opinions. Since this was costly, it was easier for stations simply to present no opinions at all.

Those who want to bring back the Fairness Doctrine often fail to note its limitations. It applied only to over-the-air broadcast channels. It didn't apply to newspapers, magazines or cable television, which was already becoming a force. CNN went on the air in 1980. Naturally, it did not apply to the internet or any of its content.

Moreover, the Fairness Doctrine was under heavy legal assault as an infringement on the First Amendment. Personally, I think it was inevitable that the Fairness Doctrine would have been killed by the Supreme Court if it hadn't been repealed.

Savior of AM Band

The abandonment of the Fairness Doctrine coincided with more sweeping changes in the radio market. For some years, the AM band had been in decline as people switched to FM, where sound quality was better for listening to music.

But the AM band was perfect for talk radio, and that became its financial savior. Once Limbaugh showed how profitable talk radio could be, it took over AM radio, where it appealed to a certain demographic of working men and women and others who liked listening to the radio while they worked.

One reason I enjoyed listening to Limbaugh is that I had his private email address. Oftentimes, while he was on the air, I would have some thought or an obscure fact that fit with whatever he was pontificating about. Literally within minutes, I would hear him repeating what I told him. It was exhilarating.

Perhaps the most important long-term effect Limbaugh had on the media is that his success helped convince Australian press baron Rupert Murdoch to launch Fox News. Longtime Republican political consultant and television producer Roger Ailes drew up the plans for Fox and helped Limbaugh go national with his radio show. (For almost 20 years before meeting Ailes, Limbaugh had labored in the vineyards of small radio stations in Kansas City, Sacramento and elsewhere.) Without Ailes's help, Limbaugh would have never become what he was.

No One on the Left

It's also well known that liberal commentators have never been able to duplicate the success of Limbaugh. Even Al Franken, a skilled entertainer with deep political knowledge, failed to find an audience for a contra-Limbaugh radio show. I think the reason for this failure is simpler than it appears: Progressives already have their own talk radio network with a broad reachNational Public Radio. It's not as ideological as conservative talk radio, of course, but NPR produces exactly what liberals want radio to do, and it does so very, very well. Moreover, I think liberals are basically content with the mainstream media: The New York Times fulfills their news needs almost perfectly. That's why they get so upset when it strays from the liberal path by publishing conservative commentary.

In truth, the Times attracts precisely zero conservative subscribers by publishing the likes of Bret Stephens. I know this from many years in the conservative movement. I even remember the first moment when I realized how closed the conservative mind had become.

It was in 2004. As I have mentioned earlier, I had been quoted extensively in an article by the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ron Suskind that ran in the Times magazine. When I asked my conservative friends what they thought of it, they universally said that they never read that leftist rag. I was shocked because I had built my career on getting stuff into the Times and had gotten pretty good at it.

I stopped listening to Limbaugh and watching Fox News in 2006, as I was beginning to shift my perspective leftward. I didn't do this so much because I no longer agreed with their ideology, but because I disagreed with their news judgment. I found myself paying attention to stupid memes circulating on the right that did not deserve any attention at all.

One of the most important things Fox and the rest of the right-wing media do is establish prioritiestelling their audience what is news and what isn't. To this day, I'm not sure if Fox viewers even know what happened on Jan. 6 or that Donald Trump was impeached for it.

Even before Limbaugh's death, there were press reports indicating that right-wing talk radio was dying. (And Fox's ratings are also collapsing.) I seriously doubt that the Limbaugh phenomenon can be duplicated, although his syndicator will undoubtedly try. I suspect that AM radio will find something other than right-wing outrage to sustain it in the post-Limbaugh erathough what that proves to be is likewise far from clear at the moment.

Bruce Bartlett is president of the DCReport board of directors.

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