Matthew Boyle writes at Breitbart:

Nationally syndicated conservative radio host Mark Levin, a former official in President Ronald Reagan’s administration, is calling on former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush to answer whether he stands with House Speaker John Boehner, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, and Majority Whip Steve Scalise in the wake of a blistering Scalise scandal concerning his longtime ties to a top aide to former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke.

"We’ve had nonstop Jeb Bush talk the last two weeks," Levin said in an email to Breitbart News late Tuesday evening. "Is there a reason why he’s silent now about the GOP leadership debacle in the House? They are his supporters after all."

"Reached earlier in the day by phone, Bush spokeswoman Kristy Campbell said, when asked for her boss’s thoughts on the scandal, that she hadn’t spoken with Bush about it yet. But she promised to track him down sometime on Tuesday and get a statement to Breitbart News about it later in the day -- a statement that still hasn’t materialized," according to Boyle.

"Since early Monday afternoon when the Scalise scandal first broke, Bush has gone missing from the political narrative -- and seems to be trying to sit out the racially-tinged incident where an establishment Republican and member of Congressional GOP leadership has come under fire from all sides for his alleged ties to top KKK officials in Louisiana," Boyle writes.

"Not only did Scalise speak at a 2002 event hosted by one of Duke’s organizations, he has -- according to Duke and Duke’s top political aide Kenneth Knight -- been in close contact for nearly a decade with Knight," Boyle continues. 

"What’s more is that Boehner and McCarthy threw their weight behind Scalise, publicly defending him in coordinated statements right as more news showed Scalise actually had a longtime personal and political relationship with Duke’s top aide Knight," according to Boyle. "Duke was the KKK’s grand wizard for a time, and Knight later became his campaign manager in his quests for various political offices."

Boyle concludes: "Breitbart News has reached out to Bush’s communications director many times throughout the day on Tuesday since that first promise for a statement on whether he stands with Scalise and the other GOP leadership officials after this -- but phone calls and emails have been ignored."

Ben Johnson reports at LifeSiteNews:

Greg Richter writes Newsmax:

Despite efforts from the left to restrict gun ownership on claims that it will reduce crime, the opposite is actually true, says Reason.com editor Nick Gillespie.

In a Sunday blog post, Gillespie points out that crime rates drop in states that enact laws allowing more people to carry concealed weapons, and they drop even further as more residents of those states avail themselves of their right.

In 1987, Gillespie notes, the total crime rate was 5,550 per 100,000 people while the violent crime rate was 610 per 100,000. By 2013, those figures had dropped to 3,099 and 368.

WHDH TV in Boston reports: 

Police in Haverhill are on the lookout for a vandal who stole baby Jesus from a manger and replaced him with a real pig's head.

Police said the vandals struck the nativity scene in front of Sacred Hearts Church in the early morning hours of Christmas Day.

"Police are investigating the incident. . . . A news conference is planned for 10 a.m. Friday," WHDH reports.

Print and video reporting on this news story are available here. 

Rich Lowry writes:

"What’s merry about all this, you ask?”

Thus began a Christmas Eve message from General Anthony McAuliffe to his troops besieged at the Belgium town of Bastogne. Adolf Hitler had launched a desperate counteroffensive against the allies in the West in December 1944. As described in the book No Silent Night: The Christmas Battle for Bastogne, the town became a linchpin of the Battle of the Bulge.

BBC reports:

U.S. police have clashed with protesters in Missouri after an officer shot dead a black teenager near where Michael Brown was killed in August, a death that triggered national protests.

A crowd of about 100 gathered at the scene in St Louis early on Wednesday after scuffles the night before. St. Louis County police said the man who was shot had pulled a gun at a petrol station and pointed it at the officer.

"For weeks there have been protests about alleged police brutality," BBC reports. "Berkeley is about two miles from the suburb of Ferguson, where the 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot dead by a white officer."

Kristine Marsh writes at Newsbusters:

Salon and Alternet seem to exist only to provide click-bait for kooks. Alternet certainly succeeded with their Sunday article entitled, "Why rape is so intrinsic to religion" which was also cross-posted on partner site Salon. In the article by Valerie Tarico, she tries to argue that the virgin birth of Jesus Christ was God raping Mary, similar to Greek and Hindu tales of gods raping women. "It's a common theme in the history of religion, and it's more than a little rapey," Tarico claims.

"'Rapey' is not exactly an adjective most would use to describe the Christmas story, but never underestimate what an Alternet writer can come up with!," Marsh writes.

"Tarico even manages to tie it all in to 'the shocking prevalence' of rape 'on college campuses and in society at large. I guess she completely ignored the Rolling Stone apology and media blow-up, showing that one student’s account of shocking gang rape might've been false. Not to mention, the most recent comprehensive study from the DOJ which shows, 20 percent of college-age women are not raped on campus, more like 0.6%," Marsh observes.

Comment: Feminism despises Christianity, for an unholy slew of reasons. Perhaps one of them is that feminism despises truly strong women. Mary, of course, could have said no, and there is no indication that God would have forced her (see Luke 1:26-38). Instead, she made an informed choice: "May your word to me be fulfilled" (Luke 1:38).

The Bible affirms the significance of human beings, that we can make decisions and change history. Choice is crucial, but it is not a blank check that lets one class of humanity (pregnant women) decide whether another class of humanity (preborn human beings) lives or dies.

Yes, Scripture does not look kindly upon abortofascism. Yet another reason some might choose to despise a God of truth and love who acts into verifiable human history to overcome evil with good.

Folks who are truly concerned about rape might note that trying to rape truth to bend it to their inhumane social and political agendas is not a sign of good faith. Let it not be done according to their word.

Related
Christmas Spirit in Space and Time

AP reports,

Christians and Satanists put up competing displays Sunday on the Michigan Capitol grounds as Christmas week got underway.

The Detroit chapter of the Satanic Temple set up its "Snaketivity Scene" featuring a snake offering a book called "Revolt of the Angels" as a gift. The snake is wrapped around the Satanic cross on the 3-feet-by-3-feet display. Capitol rules require that displays have to be taken down each night.

"Word of the Satanic Temple's plans led state Sen. Rick Jones, a Grand Ledge Republican, to erect a Nativity scene on Friday featuring baby Jesus, Joseph and Mary. He put it back up Sunday morning," AP reports.

"Jones said he was happy to 'represent the light and not the darkness'," according to AP.

Maggie Lit reports at Campus Reform:

Students at George Washington University (GWU) willingly signed a petition supporting the deportation of one American citizen in exchange for one illegal immigrant.

"Please sign our petition for President Obama to deport one American citizen, in exchange for one undocumented immigrant," read the petition. "Everyone must be allowed a shot at the ‘American Dream.' Americans should not be greedy. Let us right the wrongs of our past and make another’s dreams come true."

"It makes sense," one student told Campus Reform. "Like, I’ve noticed that there is a lot of like hatred against undocumented immigrants and it’s not necessarily their fault."

Watch the video here. 

Michael Patrick Leahy reports at Breitbart.com:

Best-selling author Brad Thor is expanding the tweet that started a social media firestorm. On Tuesday he sent out this tweet: "Hey @Reince and @GOP - let me be perfectly clear. If Jeb Bush is the nominee, I will never vote Republican again."

"Thor, whose thriller, The Lions of Lucerne, was published in 2002, has written ten additional New York Times best-sellers. His most recent novel, Act of War, was published in 2014, and a new thriller is in the works," Breitbart reports. 

Thor is "not squeamish in detailing the current condition of the United States. 'I believe that the problems facing this country are so dire I don't want someone who is going to kick my dog less'," the best-selling author said, according to Breitbart.

"We don’t need a patrician manager of the big federal  bureaucracy in D.C.," Breitbart quotes Thor as saying. "We need an absolute constitutional warrior, not only someone who is going to whittle this government down to the size it should be, but someone who is able to rally everyone behind him or her. . . . It's more important to put someone in who's going to fix things, not manage its decline."

Brittany M. Hughes reports at CNSNew.com:

When the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) went after a city council in Jay, Fla., for displaying a nativity set on public property, the atheist group might have won a battle, but seems to have lost the war.

The FFRF, known for protesting any and all religious displays in public places, sent a complaint letter recently to local officials in the 526-person city of Jay, arguing against the life-sized nativity that had been set up on the site every Christmas for nearly 40 years, the group said in a press release.

In a letter sent to the city’s mayor, FFRF attorney Andrew Seidel alleged, "It is unlawful for the town to maintain, erect, or host a holiday display that consists solely of a nativity scene, thus singling out, showing preference for, and endorsing one religion." He added there are "ample private and church grounds where religious displays may be freely placed."

"In response to the group’s complaints, the city council declared the nativity set surplus property and sold it to the Santa Rosa County Ministerial Association, thus removing it from public property," according to CNSNews.

This move appeared to please FFRF co-president Dan Barker, who "praised the city council’s decision as 'divesting the town of a divisive display'," CNSNews reports.

"But the town has not been deprived of the nativity, reports the American Pastors Network [APN]. In fact, after the ministerial association purchased the nativity, they then placed the huge Christian display on private property near one of the busiest parts of the small town, reports the American Pastors Network," according to CNSNews.

The Nativity scene "now stands at a busy corner at the town’s main stop light -- ironic, say nativity supporters, because many more people will see it there," CNSNews quotes APN as stating in a press release. 

"Anyone who actually takes time to study our nation’s history and read the writings of our founders -- not the interpretations of those writings written two hundred years later -- knows that religious liberty and the acknowledgement of Almighty God as the source of that liberty are the bulwark of our nation," CNSNews quotes President Sam Rohrer as saying in the press statement.

"Threats like these against towns that want to display nativities are a blatant attack on our God-given and constitutionally protected freedoms," Rohrer states.

"Groups like FFRF base their arguments on the sound bite of 'separation of church and state,' but again, history proves these arguments wrong, as Thomas Jefferson’s famous 'wall' was in response to the sincere concerns of the Danbury Baptist Association of Connecticut that religious freedom might be considered a favor granted by government rather than an inalienable right given by God," Rohrer states, according to Hamilton Strategies.

"FFRF would do well to remember that Jefferson himself attended congressionally approved church services held in the U.S. Capitol building itself -- the seat of American government," Rohrer advises.

"The truth remains that public displays of the nativity scene on government property in no way violate the Constitution. FFRF's attempts to stifle religious liberty, however, do."

Robert Spencer writes at Frontpagemag.com:

The details are still sketchy, but this is what is apparently confirmed as of this writing (8PM EST Sunday night): As many as 50 people have been taken hostage in the Lindt Chocolat Café in Sydney, Australia’s central pedestrian mall, Martin Place. Some of the hostages have been forced at gunpoint to hold up the black flag of Islamic jihad against a window of the café. . . .

This is an unprecedented event in the West. There have been jihad attacks, and hostage situations, but this is the first jihadist hostage event in a Western country since the Islamic State issued this threat in a September video: "We will conquer your Rome, break your crosses, and enslave your women, by the permission of Allah, the Exalted. This is His promise to us; He is glorified and He does not fail in His promise. If we do not reach that time, then our children and grandchildren will reach it, and they will sell your sons as slaves at the slave market."

Spencer concludes: "As Australians, and in due course Americans and Britons and Canadians, grow accustomed to the new possibility that a stop for a cup of coffee could result in one’s head being separated from one’s body, the time for this politically correct unreality about the jihad threat is over. Realism about the nature and magnitude of the threat is long overdue. The patrons inside the Lindt Chocolat Café, now hostages, deserve nothing less, as do the rest of the citizens of the embattled and besieged West.

American Atheists (AA) last week launched a "billboard campaign featuring a young girl writing a message to Santa Claus that reads: 'Dear Santa, All I want for Christmas is to skip church! I'm too old for fairy tales'," reports Stoyan Zaimov at Christian Post. 

"The AA billboards have gone up in major cities like Memphis, Nashville, St. Louis and Fort Smith, as well as in more residential areas near churches and schools," CP reports.

A church in Alma, Ark., responded with its own billboard ad, which states, "Questions, Doubts, Curiosity? All welcome at Grace," according to CP.

"Our goal is not to oppose their message, but rather to respond with love and support. We actually welcome their desire to support those who have felt alienated by believers and start discussion between and among the Atheist and Christian communities," Grace Church states on its website. 

Two comments. First, the church does well to welcome those with doubts, who question, and are curious. The Biblical worldview affirms the human mind as sourced in the rationality of the Creator. Therefore, churches and the Christian community in general ought to be safe places for those who want to consider and discuss whether Christianity is true and therefore warrants their commitment. 

Second, there is no need to think "love and support" is somehow an alternative to opposing the message of atheists. If atheism is false and harmful to human freedom and dignity, to "love and support" includes refuting that unfortunate message. "Speaking the truth in love" is how Ephesians 4:15 puts it.

Jesus epitomizes love, and yet his Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7) directly challenged the settled opinion and cultural powers of his day, even as it now challenges the settled opinion and cultural powers in our own day. This is good news for thinking human beings, but not so good news for the fairy tales and superstitions of atheism.

Maggie Lit reports at Campus Reform:

A Texas psychology professor was caught on video last month comparing the Tea Party to the Nazis.

Dr. Blake Armstrong, a South Texas College (STC) professor, told students not to tell anybody about his assertions; however an anonymous student who had enough of the professor’s anti-Republican rants decided to record the class on Nov. 17, as reported by The Blaze.

"This semester, [Dr. Armstrong] insulted Republicans about three times before this video was recorded," the student said, according to Jason Howerton at The Blaze. 

The student also said the professor "called Sen. Ted Cruz a bast--- for using the last name Cruz to win his election. I didn’t know exactly what he meant, but I decided to start recording,' The Blaze reports.

"It's very easy to see that [Amstrong] has a vendetta against Republicans and religion with an emphasis on Christianity," the student also reportedly said.

The "psychology concentration" page at South Texas College provides publicly available contact information for Mr. Armstrong (email: blakea@southtexascollege.edu, phone: 956-447-6658).