The World and Everything in It: April 16, 2024

PREROLL: The World and Everything in It is made possible by listeners like me. My name is Joy Ide, and I am a church organist in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. I hope you enjoy today's program.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning! A glitchy student aid form is keeping people from accepting offers from colleges.

BROWN: Any student who needs financial aid, which is the vast majority of college students, has to complete the FAFSA in order to receive it.

LINDSAY MAST: Also, convincing tech companies to care about and protect children from exploitation. And teaching kids the magic of ice sculpting.

AUDIO: The number that are ice carvers in this world. That’s one of those really small groups.

And what now for the pro-life movement?

REICHARD: It’s Tuesday, April 16th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

MAST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Good morning!

REICHARD: Time for news. Here’s Kent Covington.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: House foreign aid funding » House Speaker Mike Johnson is making another push to approve foreign aid funding for U.S. allies. But after previous efforts failed, he’s shifting strategy. He told reporters last night …

JOHNSON: What I presented to the conference tonight is our play call on this. What we’ll do is bring to the House floor independent measures. We will vote on each of these measures separately.

The House is expected to vote on four separate measures, including aid packages for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan.

A small group of Republicans scuttled a bill that would have funded aid for several U.S. allies at the same time.

He’s now hoping to squeeze the separate measures through the House’s political divides on foreign policy one at a time.

SOUND: [Iran protesters]

Israel Iran-response latest » Demonstrators in Iran chanting ‘Death to Israel’ as they celebrated an unprecedented direct attack over the weekend.

More than 300 Iranian missiles and drones rained down on the Jewish state. Israeli defenses were able to shoot down 99 percent of the incoming threats.

And Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi declared …

HALEVI: Iran will face the consequences for its actions. We will choose our response accordingly.

But some world leaders, including President Biden, are urging Israel not to strike back militarily for fear of a larger Middle East war.

BIDEN: We're committed to a cease fire that will bring the hostages home and preventing conflict from spreading beyond what it already has.

But Republicans say the White House is sending mixed messages. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Monday …

KIRBY: This is an Israeli decision to make, whether and how they’ll respond to what they did on Saturday, and we’re gonna leave it squarely with them.

Hamas rejects cease-fire » But some officials within the Israeli government also worry that striking Iran right now might mean taking the eye off the ball in Gaza.

Some Israeli leaders say destroying Hamas must remain the focus.

The terror group has rejected the latest ceasefire proposal drawing condemnation from U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

SUNAK: The conflict in Gaza must end. Hamas, which is backed by Iran, started this war. It is Israel's right, and indeed its duty, to defeat the threat from Hamas terrorists and defend its security.

Sunak also called for the world to invest in a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Trump criminal lawsuit » The first ever criminal trial of a U.S. president is underway in New York City.

Jury selection began on Monday.

Prosecutors charge that Donald Trump falsified business records to cover up hush-money payments allegedly paid to cover up an extramarital affair. Trump says that encounter never happened. And he told reporters at the courthouse:

TRUMP: This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it. And again, it’s a case that should have never been brought.

The former president is facing 34 criminal counts.

He plans to testify in his own defense, but he won’t be allowed to talk about it publicly after a judge issued a gag order in the case.

Supreme Court Idaho trans protections » Idaho’s law protecting children from transgender treatments will stand, at least for now after a Supreme Court ruling on Monday. WORLD's Mark Mellinger has more.

MARK MELLINGER: Under the law, passed last year, physicians could spend up to a decade behind bars if they prescribe cross-gender hormones, puberty blockers, and other potential life-altering treatments to kids.

The liberal activist group, the ACLU convinced a court to temporarily block the law. But Idaho’s attorney general challenged the injunction, calling it too broad.

Five of the high court’s justices agreed, and will let the law stand while the injunction is appealed.

Under the court’s order, however, this ban will not affect the two teenagers who initially challenged it.

Looking ahead, the Supreme Court has yet to announce if it’ll consider the Biden administration’s challenge to a similar law in Tennessee.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Mark Mellinger.

Pakistan rain kills nearly 50 people » Authorities in Pakistan have declared a state of emergency after severe weather killed at least 49 people over the past few days.

Heavy rains have caused dozens of houses to collapse in the country’s northwest. And lightning struck several farmers as they harvested wheat.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in televised remarks that he had ordered authorities to deliver aid and other relief to devastated areas.

I’m Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: the logjam in federal financial aid. Plus, ice carving in Alaska.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Tuesday the 16th of April, 2024. This is WORLD Radio! Thanks for listening. Good morning, I’m Mary Reichard.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. First up on The World and Everything in It: Students in limbo.

This Spring, many high school seniors across the country are deciding where they’ll go to college. Often, a key step in the process is filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, during the fall… then waiting for colleges to send acceptance letters and financial aid packages at the beginning of the year. By April, students should be making commitments ahead of deadlines this month.

REICHARD: Well, that’s what’s supposed to happen. Last fall, the Education Department reworked FAFSA to try to make it easier for students, but program delays and technical bugs have left many students waiting to submit their FAFSA…and putting college decisions on the line.

MAST: So why did the FAFSA change and what’s wrong with the new version? WORLD’s education beat reporter Lauren Dunn has the story.

LAUREN DUNN: Sima Farid and her 17-year-old daughter live in New Jersey. Farid’s daughter is a high school senior and wants to go into biomedical engineering.

SIMA FARID: My daughter was impacted medically, as a child by some some health issues, and she wants to give back and help in a manner that helped her.

So, she applied to the whole gamut of schools in the fall and submitted the new FAFSA form once it came out in December, and then waited for it to be processed, and waited.

FARID: It wasn't until I think, last week for us, and I filled it out the first week the form was available.

Farid’s daughter got into most of the schools she applied for, but they didn’t send her a financial aid package, because they couldn’t access her FAFSA information.

If they don’t know their financial aid package, Farid says she might need to commit to the New Jersey Institute of Technology which didn’t offer any scholarships but has a smaller sticker price.

FARID: Without the financial aid determination and knowing where we're at, that tuition is in state that's about the most I could do. I would have to have her commit to there or commit to a non-engineering school which offered her more money and I knew was more affordable out of pocket which would alter then the major that she wants to choose because they don’t offer engineering.

Students all over the country are facing the same problems. According to the National College Attainment Network, FAFSA completion rates are down about 40 percent from last year.

Catherine Brown is a policy advocate with the organization. She says normally, most students who go to college complete the FAFSA, and then they complete another one every year they’re attending school and want government aid.

CATHERINE BROWN: Not only does it unlock federal financial aid, it also unlocks most institutional aid and also state financial aid. So basically, any student who needs financial aid, which is the vast majority of college students, has to complete the FAFSA in order to receive it.

In 2020, U.S. lawmakers passed a law to simplify the FAFSA. Normally, the form becomes available on October 1, but the Department of Education released the new version in December.

The new version is slimmed down from roughly 100 questions to fewer than 40.

It also simplifies the process by pulling some information directly from the IRS instead of students having to find it and prove it’s correct.

BROWN: So for those that have been able to get through it, that have not had any technical glitches, they have reported overwhelmingly that it's a positive experience.

But others have experienced glitches, and of the forms submitted about 30 percent contain processing or data errors.

So not only did colleges start receiving the FAFSA information two months later than usual, the forms they do have may contain errors.

Brown says the Department of Education released a list of which forms have the problems, but colleges will have to go through it manually.

BROWN: If you're trying to package aid for thousands of students, you don't really have time to sort of go line by line and see which, you know, case number is error free versus error filled.

If a college does decide to process the forms and send aid packages anyway, they’ll have to redo the process if there’s an error and the student is owed more or less aid.

So, most colleges have instead pushed back decision deadlines. But Brown worries that since most students require some kind of financial aid, the FAFSA issues could mean many high school graduates delay college or don’t go at all.

BROWN: The cost of college is too high, and it's skyrocketed. It's exceeding inflation. And we need structural measures to bring that cost down, absolutely…We believe in the simplified FAFSA and we’d like to see if that translates into more students receiving financial aid and going on to college.

CATO Institute education researcher Neal McCluskey says government student aid started out as a way to help low-income students go to college, so how did it become a necessary step in almost every student’s path to college?

NEAL MCCLUSKY: Economists call it the third-party payer problem where, you know, it's not the college paying. And it's not often the student paying, although the student pays some of this. But a lot of what's paid is paid for by third parties, in particular taxpayers.

McCluskey says this means colleges and students are less incentivized to be efficient and economize, because to an extent, students can always find the money to pay for it. And he says the Biden administration’s student loan forgiveness program would only make it worse.

MCCLUSKY: That will be sort of across the board telling everyone take on more debt, don't worry, you won't have to repay it all.

He says the best way to bring higher education prices down would be slowly reducing the amount of government aid available.

But that solution would help future students.

For now, the Department of Education is working on the FAFSA to help students afford college in the current system.

Catherine Brown says that once the corrections are completed, more students and families can get out of limbo and start making decisions.

BROWN: We're hoping within the next two weeks the process will be smooth in terms of once students complete it, within one to three days colleges will receive that information, and then the financial aid package, the financial aid offers will come to students.

Mary Muncy contributed research and reporting to this story. For WORLD, I’m Lauren Dunn.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: protecting children online.

A quick word to parents: this story deals with material related to exploitation, so you may want to fast-forward about six minutes and come back later.

LINDSAY MAST: On Wednesday, a subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will host a hearing about legislation to protect young people on the internet. This follows a Senate Judiciary hearing earlier this year in which lawmakers grilled the heads of tech companies like Meta, Twitter, and TikTok.

REICHARD: Some of these companies have already taken steps to improve. For instance, Instagram last week announced that it’s testing a feature to blur photos that may contain nudity. And it would prompt users to think twice before sending or receiving these images.

But are changes like this too little too late?

MAST: Joining us now to talk about it is Tim Nester. He’s Senior Director of Communications for NCOSE, an acronym for the National Center on Sexual Exploitation.

It’s an advocacy group working through legislation and corporate policy to end sexual exploitation.

REICHARD: Tim, good morning.

TIM NESTER: Good morning. Thanks for having me.

REICHARD: Well, Tim, each year NCOSE compiles a list of twelve corporations that enable sexual exploitation. You call it the “Dirty Dozen” list and it came out last week. What are some of the companies on this list that may surprise people to know are enabling bad actors?

NESTER: Yeah, thanks for asking that. It’s, it’s always a surprise when this list comes out. There’s some companies that everyone expects and others that will kind of catch you off guard. Some examples would be Apple, CashApp, Roblox—which if you have kids who like to play games, they’re going to be familiar with Roblox, you’ll be surprised to hear that one’s on here. I think LinkedIn has caught a few people off guard this year, but we’ve listed them, as well as Spotify, the popular music streaming app as well.

REICHARD: Your organization has no doubt sent this list to the offenders. Any response?

NESTER: Yeah, every year, we send a notification letter to these companies before the list is published. Basically, we want to give them a chance to respond to take action to get themselves off the list, which in some cases has happened. We’ve moved them off the main list to a watch list or replaced them with a different target. But every year they have a chance to respond, and we actually already have some victories this year to share, with Apple removing some of the nudifying and horrible apps that they have available on their app store that were rated for kids 4 and up, and so they removed those as soon as we flagged them. And you already mentioned with Meta, Instagram is testing out a feature that will blur all explicit photos sent to or from minors up to age 18, which before that was only up to age 15. So that was a huge win as well.

REICHARD: No surprise to see that Meta is on the list…it owns Instagram…plenty of reports about predators exploiting children through that app. What would Meta need to do to get off the “Dirty Dozen” list?

NESTER: You know, there's so much with Meta. They, they own some of the most dangerous platforms for kids, arguably the most dangerous apps for kids, and so what we need them to do is to have safety features on by default. And this only happens through public pressures, we need to make sure they're protecting kids. They just launched end-to-end encryption, which we think is incredibly dangerous, and really enables those who want to perpetuate exploitation against others, especially minors, to work in anonymity. And so we want to make sure that they are protecting kids and calling out those who would perpetrate this kind of exploitation against others. And honestly, we need to see them do proactive detection and removing of all grooming. And they haven't done that yet. They usually wait until they're called out and in trouble and the public moves, then Meta responds. We want them to be proactive in protecting people.

REICHARD: Tim, do you have any concrete examples of how children have experienced harm on these platforms?

NESTER: I do, and sadly, there’s too many examples across many of these platforms. But one that jumps out to me that hit really close to home for me, because I have a 17-year-old son, is the story of well, a boy we’ll call Alex. It’s not his real name. We’ve changed his name just to protect his identity, but it’s a true story.

So a 17 year old boy named Alex met a teenage girl online named Macy, at least that’s what he thought her name was, and he thought she was a teenage girl, they began chatting. And over time that conversation quickly escalated to Macy asking Alex for sexually explicit images. And she also, as far as he knew, sent him some sexually explicit images. Unbeknownst to him, Macy was a sextortionist, and was not a teenage girl. We actually don’t know the identity of this individual.

But the long and short of it is over the course of one evening, it took about five hours, Alex went from a healthy 17 year-old-boy, a member of youth group, good Christian family, healthy mental awareness of how to be careful online, to the point where he made a mistake, sent an explicit image and was immediately told, “If you don’t cooperate and send me $1,000, I’m going to send these pictures to your family, to your friends” they started listing family and friends that were on their friends list, “until it goes viral, and all you have to do is send me the money and I won’t expose you.” So Alex, being a teenager, did not have a lot of money, sent everything he had. He had about $400 total that he could send. The person said, “That’s not what I asked for, pay me more now.” He said “I don’t have any more.” The person essentially mocked him, and then posted the images. And Alex, who was of course feeling like his life was just ruined, he made the worst mistake of his life, ended up dying by suicide that night, and his family found him the next morning. And this is just one example of how these platforms should be able to shut that down before it ever gets to that point. Messaging like this should never be happening on Instagram. When someone is creating an account, pretending to be someone they’re not, and extorting another human being, it should not be allowed. And that company in my opinion, should be held accountable for that.

REICHARD: Final question here: these are huge problems, and huge corporations enabling a lot of wickedness. Speak to Christians now. What 2-3 things that you and I can do?

NESTER: Yeah, it starts with prayer, and with good conversation with our kids. I think spending that time talking through these issues honestly and openly with our kids makes a big difference. If I can just share as a dad of teenagers, when I just tell them, “No” about a platform they want to use, because they tell me they’re the only teenager in our entire city who doesn’t have this platform. So we talk about it. And when I just tell them, “No,” I’m gonna get resistance, and chances are pretty good they might even try to sneak around and figure out a way to get access. But if I actually sit down and talk through, okay, here’s the problems with this platform, here’s the stories of things that have been happening on this platform, we can talk through, honestly, these issues. And maybe we land in a compromised spot where it’s alright, we’ll create an account, but I get access to your account. Or maybe we just skip it, and we’ll circle back to it when you’re a little bit older. So I think open and honest conversation with your family, with your kids, especially as they become teenagers is super important. But I also think getting the word out to other families, whether it’s in your church groups in your neighborhood and the workplace, talking with people about not only the dangers of some of these platforms, but also what they can do. And in our case, we encourage people to go to dirtydozenlist.com, you can see all of the targets. And we’ve made these actions super simple. You click on each target, there’s a big “take action” button that’ll pop up with you right when you click on the target, and it’ll be anything from a contact your local representative if you’re a U.S. citizen, or it could be email the executive of this company and let them know it’s time for them to make a change. So we have actions ready to go, it doesn’t take more than 20 seconds per action to do something about this.

REICHARD: Tim Nester is senior director of communications at the National Center on Sexual Exploitation. Tim, thank you so much for your time, and for your good work on this issue!

NESTER: Thank you. Appreciate it.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s the day after tax day. Maybe you’re one of those people who filed for an extension to pay taxes?

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Not saying.

Well, just in case. If you did, here are some unusual deductions to consider when you do file. Relocate for a job? If so, did you know that you can deduct the cost of moving your pet as well as yourself?

REICHARD: Good to know!

MAST: Swimming pool on your property? You can deduct maintenance costs if you have a medical condition alleviated by swimming.

Along the same lines, want to stop smoking? You may be able to deduct the cost of patches or a program to help you stop. Here’s another one: You do charity work and also pay a babysitter so you can do that? That may also be deductible!

REICHARD: Lots of maybes. Guess that’s why we need tax accountants!

MAST: I can depreciate that!

It’s The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Today is Tuesday, April 16th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day. Good morning. I’m Lindsay Mast.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: Ice sculpting.

Every year, thousands of tourists flock to Fairbanks, Alaska, for the World Ice Art Championships. Scores of world-class ice carvers show up, eager to show off their skills.

MAST: The origins of ice sculpting aren’t crystal clear, but Inuit peoples have been building ice and snow houses here for an estimated 4,000 years. These days, modern artists use the medium to create dazzling and intricate sculptures.

REICHARD: WORLD Feature Reporter Grace Snell recently caught up with a master ice sculptor who’s working to pass the craft on to the next generation.

JIM WARNER: Okay, can I get everybody’s attention…

GRACE SNELL: Inside a snow-bound workshop, a sturdy man with a shaggy gray beard addresses a roomful of students.

SOUND: [Kids talking and laughing, Warner instructing]

His name is Jim Warner, and he’s been carving ice for about 25 years. The last 15 of those he’s spent chipping in here at the annual youth classic hosted by Ice Alaska—the Fairbanks nonprofit that organizes the World Ice Art Championships.

WARNER: I’m really trying to instill in these kids the enjoyment that you can have in doing something like this, and, and just the satisfaction of finishing something in a short period of time, that is pretty unique.

It’s Warner’s way of keeping alive the craft he loves.

WARNER: When I first got into it, you could list, just offhandedly, 30 to 40 people that were ice carvers that actually did stuff around the city. Right now there is maybe five or six of us. And the youngest one of that group is probably in middle/late 50s.

After a short huddle, Warner dismisses the students and leads the way into the bright glare of the Ice Alaska park. Warner doesn’t have any work out here this year. He’s 72 now, and his doctor told him to take it easy after a recent back surgery. But he wants to make sure the next generation of ice carvers are ready to carry on the tradition.

WARNER: The overall idea is to give them the mental tools to be able to go ahead and go through this thing and come out to what they hope they can do with those pieces of ice.

A winding path leads straight into a stand of black spruce trees. Everywhere, the wood is dotted with a dazzling array of sculptures: dinosaurs, gladiators, acrobats. Even a humpback whale.

WARNER: I actually really like the flower. One back there. Straight, straight back that way…

They sparkle like cut glass in the afternoon light.

SOUND: [Sanders whirring, kids chattering]

Just ahead is a small woodland clearing where the kids quickly set to work. The teams are already halfway through the three-day competition, and starting to feel the crunch.

SOUND: [Chisels scraping on ice]

Big ice blocks poke out of the snow all around—most already half-transformed into fanciful creatures.

WARNER: They’re going to be having the cat sitting on a shelf with books underneath. And the cat has got a bunch of books that are piled up here. And one of the books is going to be open and the cat is basically reading the book.

Nearby, two boys, Noah and Philip, are working together on a giant bowl of ramen noodles. The design started as a joke, they say. But now, it’s well on its way to becoming a three-by-four foot reality.

WARNER: So there was a crack that went through the whole block right there. So when you’re working on this side, just be really careful that you don’t run into the same situation or what happened over on this side.

Warner makes his rounds, checking in with students and offering advice. He shows them how to use an odd mix of tools. Everything from chisels and sanders to a snaggle-toothed instrument called a “pickle fork.”

WARNER: This, the pickle fork, this is strictly, like, for ice. Here's an example of that burr thing that I was talking about, that green thing there, you see how it has all the little teeth sticking out of it…

Warner says carving ice is faster, and more forgiving, than working with traditional materials.

WARNER: If you mess up and break off pieces of stone or break off a piece of wood or something, you basically almost have to start over. All they do is just basically make sure that the two ends will fit together well, and squirt a little water in there and 10 minutes later you’re done.

But, there’s a trade-off. Ice carvers have to brave freezing temperatures and watch all their hard work melt away in the next summer thaw.

SOUND: [Sander whirring]

The work can also be dangerous, too, Warner says.

WARNER: All the power tools that do have safety guards on them, 99 percent of the time, we take those safety guards off because they get in the way when we try and work in the ice itself.

Warner and the other instructors handle the chainsaws at the youth competition.

Trying to bring an artistic vision to life on a deadline is never easy. Two students, Omar and Jay, are busy shaping their block into a woman’s portrait.

OMAR: This is the only actual human I’ve done. I’ve done a bird, a snake, a clamshell, a whale tail, and this…

Omar says he doesn’t feel great about their progress so far.

OMAR: It’s, it’s different and kind of frustrating to be honest…

Another competitor, a ten-year-old named Lincoln, is already nearing the end of his project.

LINCOLN: The reason why I did this for my grandma is because she says that I’m her vitamin D. And, and that’s really nice of her. So her birthday is coming up, so I’m making a huge sun and a heart in the middle, I love Grandma.

Many of the students keep coming back year after year. And Warner says, for him, that’s the biggest win.

WARNER: So, to me, I think that’s kind of really a good thing. Because that means that they must have had a good enough time and felt that they did a good enough job with what they did in the past that they want to come back and try again.

Just two days later, all those long, cold hours of carving finally pay off…

SOUND: [Clapping, cheering at awards ceremony]

Elizabeth and Pauline won first place with their statue of a cat reading a book. But all the students gathered on stage to celebrate completing over 24 hours carving outside in temperatures below ten degrees.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Grace Snell in Fairbanks, Alaska.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, April 16th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Up next: the state of the pro-life movement. WORLD Opinions commentator Andrew Walker says these are challenging times for those who defend life, but there is a way forward.

ANDREW WALKER: Last week brought crushing setbacks for the pro-life movement.

On Monday, former President Donald Trump released a video in which he stated that abortion ought to be an issue worked out in the states. By doing so, he signaled he would not pursue a federal abortion ban. Then, on Tuesday, Arizona’s Supreme Court upheld that state’s abortion ban by appealing to an 1864 law. That’s technically a victory, but some leading Republicans in the state are criticizing the decision. Some are even falling backwards into a functional pro-choice ethic because abortion is so politically flammable.

So, where does this put the pro-life movement? It’s in shambles. It’s no secret that post-Dobbs, we’ve had no singular, agreed-upon strategy. What’s worse, everywhere abortion has gone on the ballot, Americans have affirmed a strong preference for abortion. Abortion is a political loser for Republicans, many insist. And in electoral terms, they may be right. Too many Americans rely on abortion as the fail-safe for their sexual autonomy.

But I would like to suggest a strategy: pursue whatever pro-life legislation is politically possible in your context. This is technically what we would call an “ameliorist” perspective. Someone who wants to ameliorate something wants to make things better, step- by- practical -step. Unless opponents of abortion are willing to call for regime change, revolution, or civil war, then guess what? We are all incrementalists now. We can’t escape the hard work of step-by-step change.

Our final goal should always be to see preborn children protected under the 14th amendment. Many pro-lifers are already making that argument, though we are probably still a generation away from seeing it accepted fully by the courts.

Until then, let’s save as many lives as possible and keep working to save more. We are not begging for scraps from the abortion lobby. We are merely acting within the constraints of democracy—if only because democracy is the least worst type of government.

We need to stop posturing and do politics. We must do the actual work of mobilizing, supporting, voting, and reaching people with good arguments and accurate information. (This includes using videos, TikToks, podcasts, articles, books, and every other medium where people are.)

We should register our complaints with both Biden and Trump even while acknowledging that the two are not the same. Trump’s excellent Supreme Court appointments made it possible to end Roe, while Biden remains the hood ornament on the party of death.

That said, murdering preborn human beings is not a states’ rights issue. Why? Because no law that violates God’s natural law can ever be a just law. It is wrong to murder a human being at any stage of life. The Declaration of Independence insists that all are endowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights—life the first among them.

It’s quite simple: Our nation knows the Dred Scott decision was wrong because it treated black Americans as less than human. Joe Biden and Donald Trump are also wrong to treat preborn children as less than human. Instead, they ought to extend them equal protection under the 14th Amendment. It’s the only morally consistent position to hold. Let’s all work toward that end, in Jesus’ name.

I’m Andrew Walker.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Tomorrow: political corruption in high office. We’ll have a report on what a House investigation into Biden family business dealings has uncovered. That, on Washington Wednesday. And, giving Ukrainians hope by rebuilding their country. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Lindsay Mast.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

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 records Paul coming before the Roman Council,  and when he “perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, ‘Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. It’s with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.’ And when he’d said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all.” —Acts 23:6-8

Go now in grace and peace.

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