The World and Everything in It: February 1, 2024

PREROLL: The World and Everything in It is made possible by listeners like us. My name is Sarah Nuss and I live in Carville, Colorado where I am a rural school superintendent. My friend Darlene recommended the world and everything in it years ago and now tuning in is part of my daily routine. I hope you enjoy today's program.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning! Texas Governor Greg Abbott is ordering new barriers at the southern border. Is the law on his side?

AUDIO: Because Joe Biden is not enforcing the federal immigration laws, that gives Texas the right…to defend ourselves from imminent harm or from invasion.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Also, teaching senior citizens to use new technology. And a day in the life of a vaccine injury lawyer.

AUDIO: Families hear the same thing, right? Vaccines are totally safe. Nobody gets injured by a vaccine and then you're that one person and we’re often the ones that believe them first.

And WORLD commentator Cal Thomas on Canada’s censorship of Jordan Peterson.

REICHARD: It’s Thursday, February 1st. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

BROWN: And I’m Myrna Brown. Good morning!

REICHARD: It’s time now for the news with Kent Covington.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Drone attack latest » The White House has identified the group that carried out the deadly drone attack against U.S. troops in the Middle East. It’s described as an “umbrella group” called the Islamic Resistance. It includes several Iran-backed militias.

Reporters asked President Biden if he believes Iran should be held accountable for the attack.

BIDEN: I do hold them responsible in the sense that they’re supplying the weapons to the people who did it.

National Security Council spokesman Kirby says the United States will strike back, adding that response “won’t just be a one-off.”

KIRBY: As I said, the first thing you see will not be the last thing. There’s a lot of moving pieces in that in terms of what you’re going to choose to go after, what you’re electing not to go after and why.

Republicans on Capitol Hill say the United States must hit Iran where it hurts. Congressman Michael Waltz says we should target things like Iran’s oil terminals and key operatives.

WALTZ: Iran will trade the lives of its proxies. That’s a good trade — militia lives for ours. We have to start taking Iranians off the battlefield.

President Biden says he’s already decided how the United States will respond.

Iran has threatened to retaliate if the United States takes any action to hold Tehran accountable for attacks by its proxy groups.

Blinken to Middle East, Cease-fire talks » John Kirby also announced Wednesday that Secretary of State Tony Blinken is heading back to the Middle East this week. That news comes as the United States is trying to help broker another cease-fire that would see more Hamas hostages set free.

KIRBY: All I can promise you is that, from literally from the president on down, everybody in the administration is working this very, very hard. We want to get those folks home to their families where they belong.

This will be Blinken’s fifth visit to the region since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

RBIN: [Gavel] This meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee will come to order.

Social media child safety » At the Capitol lawmakers grilled top executives with social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram about protecting children online.

The hearing highlighted issues like sexual predators, addictive features, suicide, and bullying.

Senators on both sides of the aisle accused the companies of prioritizing profit over the safety of kids. GOP Sen. Josh Hawley:

HAWLEY: Would you like now to apologize to the victims who have been harmed by your product? Show him the pictures. Would you like to apologize for what you have done to these good people?

Guests in the hearing room held up pictures of children victimized on social media.

Mark Zuckerberg is CEO of Meta, Facebook and Instagram’s parent company. He told the Senate Judiciary Committee:

ZUCKERBERG: We put special restrictions on teen accounts on Instagram. By default, accounts for under-16s are set to private, have the most restrictive content settings, and can’t be messaged by adults that they don’t follow or people they aren’t connected to.

Meta is facing lawsuits from states claiming it deliberately designed addictive features for children and failed to protect them from predators.

Lawmakers have discussed crafting legislation to regulate child safety online.

China cyber threat hearing » Meantime across the Capitol rotunda FBI Director Chris Wray warned a House committee about grave threats from Chinese government hackers.

WRAY: China’s multi-pronged assault on our national and economic security make it the defining threat of our generation.

He said Beijing is taking aim at critical infrastructure including water treatment, the electrical grid, transportation systems as well as companies and everyday Americans.

WRAY: Today and literally every day, they are actively attacking our economic security, engaging in wholesale theft of our innovation and our personal and corporate data.

Wray said China is stealing from the United States on an unimaginable scale while also preparing for cyber warfare.

Fed Rates » Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell says interest rates will stay right where they are for now at roughly five and a half percent.

POWELL: The committee does not expect that it will be appropriate to reduce the target range until it has gained greater confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2%.

But there are also no plans to raise rates in the foreseeable future.

The U.S. inflation rate has slowly settled down from its peak of more than 9 percent in 2022.

Farmers protest » In France, tractors with horns blaring are the only traffic moving on a major highway leading into Paris today.

Farmers in France, Belgium, and Italy are escalating their protests, blocking major traffic routes and moving towards Brussels ahead of a key EU summit.

They’re demanding better prices for their produce and less government regulation.

FARMER: [Speaking French]

One farmer said “We make a margin of a few percent, whereas a supermarket will make twice as much, so where's the logic in that?”

The European Commission has proposed measures aimed at increasing revenue for farms while easing some environmental restrictions.

I’m Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: What the Founding Fathers thought about border security. Plus, vaccine injuries.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: It’s Thursday the 1st of February, 2024.

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. First up: a political standoff at the Southern border continues.

Earlier this week, we reported on the response of Texas to an order from the Supreme Court to allow federal agents to remove barriers such as razor wire, at least for now. So far, Texas National Guard troops have continued to install new barriers in Eagle Pass, Texas, the epicenter of this dispute.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott explained his rationale on FOX News on Monday.

ABBOTT: Because Joe Biden is not enforcing the federal immigration laws, that gives Texas the right, under that Article I section 10 of the Constitution, to defend ourselves from imminent harm or from invasion.

BROWN: Twenty-five Republican governors support Abbott, and since he’s not backing down, where do we go from here?

Joining us now to talk about it is Joshua Treviño. He is Chief of Intelligence and Research at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

Good morning, Joshua!

JOSHUA TREVIÑO: Good morning, Mary.

REICHARD: Let’s start with how the border is supposed to work. The Texas border is the same as the national border. What does the law require with regard to border security?

TREVIÑO: The law requires that those who wish to cross the border cross at legal ports of entry, there's a lot of nuance to it. But that's really the fundamental point to be made. And with several million people failing to do that, it's why our border is out of control.

REICHARD: Governor Abbott released a statement last week saying that the federal government has broken the compact it has with the states. Explain that compact. What is it?

TREVIÑO: Sure, the federal government actually undertakes a series of responsibilities under the Constitution toward the states. Chief among them, very explicitly set forth in the Constitution are to guarantee a republican, small "r" republican, form of government to each of the states, and also to defend them against invasion. And it's on the latter that the federal government is currently failing its duties under the Constitution.

REICHARD: How did we get to this point of a governor and the president in direct confrontation?

TREVIÑO: It took a long time for us to get to this point, Mary. It really took a decade plus of Washington D.C. mostly, and I stress the mostly part of it, failing to meet its responsibilities under the Constitution. And certainly in the past four years, we've seen that abdication of responsibility and metastasize, go to new levels, and get to the point where it was simply intolerable for Texas and Texans to endure what was going on any longer. So we're very supportive of what governor Governor Abbott is doing.

REICHARD: Joshua, does it concern you that Governor Abbott is ignoring an order from the Supreme Court of the United States?

TREVIÑO: Governor Abbott is not ignoring an order from the Supreme Court of the United States. And I'm glad you ask that, because it's important to clarify. All the Supreme Court has done so far is lift an injunction from the Fifth Circuit that prohibited the federal government from tearing down Texas border barriers. The federal government, according to the court, may now do that. But the governor of Texas has not been enjoined to stop constructing border barriers. So to his credit, he's gone right on doing it.

REICHARD: One term constantly mentioned is “invasion.” Governor Abbott has made a declaration of state invasion. I’ve heard others say no, an invasion means “armed military take over.” Josh, you’ve researched this. What did you find?

TREVIÑO: What we found at the Texas Public Policy Foundation is that invasion, as envisioned by the Founders, really requires two elements to it. One is entry and everyone knows that illegal migrants are entering the country, but the other is enmity, hostility to the country that they're entering. So to be clear, a migrant entering the United States for work, even if illegally, is not an invader. The people who are the invaders are the cartels, the human traffickers, and the state governments, foreign state governments that are actually behind the trafficking phenomenon. And they're the ones that transformed this from a migration crisis into an invasion crisis.

REICHARD: Reference the Founding Fathers, what they said about this.

TREVIÑO: Well, what the Founding Fathers had to say, and they drew upon a wide corpus of experience in law, and their points of reference were really threefold. One was Indian tribes, which is not really relevant at this point in history. The other was actual invasion by foreign armies. And the third, which we think is the most applicable to the current situation, was the matter of pirates. Pirates and privateers, some of whom operated under the color of a foreign state, as in fact the Mexican cartels and human traffickers do, others of which were more of freelance criminal operatives. And that's what the Founders saw as invaders. And that's what we believe is relevant now.

REICHARD: Joshua, what can you tell us regarding the cartels that traffic humans and drugs by the numbers?

TREVINO: Well, what I can tell you is this: is that no one really knows the numbers. And that's the problem. You know, when you look at the official figures, for example, you see in December 2023 the largest number ever, numbers in the hundreds of thousands, six figures' worth of individuals. What you're not seeing there is anywhere from three to four to five times that number that actually got into the United States unnoticed. Unencountered is the term that gets used. And that's really where the concern lies, that you have millions of individuals entering the United States, and it is millions, unknown, unaccounted for, and unanswerable to any kind of authority that, for example, you and I would be. And that's an existential problem that a nation cannot long endure.

REICHARD: How do you see this standoff playing out, and what can an average American do about it?

TREVIÑO: Great question. You know, I, it's, it's impossible to prognosticate. I do happen to think that because this is ultimately a political question - I don't mean a partisan one. Sentiment for this cuts across partisan identification as well, it should, but because it is a strictly political question, ultimately, the adjudication for this is going to be at the ballot box in some way, and I have faith that the American people writ large are going to make the right choice for themselves and the security of their own country.

REICHARD: Joshua Treviño is Chief of Intelligence and Research at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Thanks for your time today!

TREVIÑO: Thank you, Mary.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Up next: Tech-smart seniors.

They say you can’t teach old dogs new tricks, but new data from AARP shows many older people are picking up new technology. Last year was the first time in which Americans 50 and older bought smart devices at the same rate as younger people. That includes folks in the 70 plus category who are buying smartphones, smart TVs, and tablets.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: So how is smart technology changing how older Americans live their lives? WORLD Radio’s Mary Muncy reports.

MARY MUNCY: Phil Olson and Bill Yozipovich are both in their 70s and work as realtors in Indian, but they have very different ideas about how useful technology is in their business.

Yozipovich used to teach technology classes to high school and junior high students before becoming a realtor. He says some of the new tech is making his current job easier.

BILL YOZIPOVICH: FaceTime, it's great. When we go through and show somebody if say out of state and want to see their house, we FaceTime them. Things that we couldn't do before.

Olson is more skeptical.

PHIL OLSON: Instead of communicating with people face to face, it allows us to kind of hide behind the scenes, and I think we lose a lot by that. Real estate is all about getting to know people.

It’s also constantly changing. Olson and his coworkers had training for a new web based platform for the business the next day… the business has changed its platform several times since Olson started in realty in 2005.

OLSON: In order to be able to do real estate efficiently, you have to learn the new program. We don't die at 70. You know, I still have life left in me, but I don't have the life left me to learn stuff that I was doing just fine.

So what’s driving many Americans like Olson and Yozipovich to learn the new tools?

Steve Ewell is the Executive Director of the Consumer Technology Association Foundation. He says the growing number is partly because people already used to adopting new tech have gotten older. And as Americans work longer, they have to learn new tools in the industry.

STEVE EWELL: It's all about finding what is that value proposition. You know, why do I want to learn about that new piece of technology? If I can have a really good reason to learn it, then, you know, people of all ages are happy to find it and adopt it.

Ewell says part of the value proposition for older adults is fueled by children and grandchildren who want to FaceTime their grandparents or watch a movie at their house… If the grandparents want to do that, they may decide to get high-speed internet, a smartphone, and a smart TV so they can access streaming services… things they may not get otherwise.

But it’s also partly because the tech has become more useful and usable as companies start to market to a population that’s gaining increasing buying power.

EWELL: Everyday 10,000 people turn 65 here in the U.S., and that's continuing to go on and grow over the next decade or so.

Some of the biggest growth trends Ewell and other experts that I spoke with are seeing are in that social and entertainment technology… but health tech is growing right along with it.

Ewell says some of that growth is because with a bigger market share comes more options… which means people can find things that fit their lifestyle.

So maybe mom or grandma doesn’t want to use Life Alert, but she would use an Apple or Garmin watch which both have fall-detection capabilities.

EWELL: Often what we find is people are interested in having something that doesn't necessarily call them out as an older adult because you have that product, you know. They want the same, you know, watch or the same headphones or whatever that they see their, their kids or their friends and others have.

And if someone likes their gadget, they’re more likely to keep it with them. After all, a Life Alert doesn’t work if the button is on the kitchen counter across the room.

Now, some companies are developing AI that can detect when someone falls and send an alert or even analyze movement to help know when someone needs a walker.

Tools like that can give caregivers some peace of mind with minimal invasion of privacy—even if the caregiver can’t be present 24/7. Ewell says that’s especially important as the number of aging adults rises… while the younger population lags behind.

EWELL: I never want to replace the people in the system. I mean, the people in the system, those connections are critical. But if we don't have enough people in the system, that technology can be something that can help provide some additional level of support, some additional level of connection.

Back in their office, realtors Olson and Yozipovich are finding some technology that works for them even if they’re frustrated by having to learn a new system.

OLSON: I love getting my email I can read on my phone versus have to get out a computer so you know, stuff like that. It's very beneficial, especially in real estate.

Both say it takes time and effort to keep up with the latest and greatest tech, but they’ll keep doing it, as long as they have a good reason to.

YOZIPOVICH: It's endless. It's always learning. And what's here today is gone tomorrow.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Mary Muncy.

AUDIO: Take your marks…horn…Splash!

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And they’re off!

Last week, Betty Brussel didn’t finish first in this swim race in Canada, but she did break a world record.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: How’s that?

REICHARD: Because she’s 99 years old! Sound here from C-B-C Vancouver.

BETTY BRUSSEL: Most of my records, I didn't know I was going for, I come out and they say you broke the record.

Brussel finished the 400 meter freestyle in just under 12 minutes and 50 seconds. That’s almost four minutes faster than the prior record for her age category.

She took up swimming after she retired in the 80s and hasn’t stopped.

BRUSSEL: People come up to me and they say, “I thought I was too old to start” or “I think I'm going to quit, I'm getting old” and they look at me and they say, “well, you can do it if you want to.”

BROWN: It’s never too late!

REICHARD: I can testify to that myself.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Thursday, February 1st, 2024. This is WORLD Radio and we’re so glad you’ve joined us today. Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: compensation for vaccine injuries.

Doctors and public health officials insist that, generally speaking, vaccines are safe. But they acknowledge that in some cases, an individual could suffer an adverse reaction from receiving one.

REICHARD: It’s a touchy subject these days. But it’s the job of Rene Gentry to deal with vaccine injuries all day long. She’s a lawyer in Washington who is strongly pro-vaccine. Yet she specializes in representing people with vaccine injuries. Her goal is to get them the help they need to pay their medical bills.

BROWN: WORLD senior writer Emma Freire recently visited Gentry’s office and brings us the story.

STUDENT: This is I guess our certificates of or validation of our ability to practice as student attorneys in the court of federal claims.

RENE GENTRY: It’s your admission to the bar.

EMMA FREIRE: Attorney Rene Gentry is meeting with some of her students at the George Washington University Law School. Gentry has her own law firm but she’s also the director of the school’s Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic. Her office is in a red brick building located a few blocks from the White House.

AUDIO: [Street noise]

The clinic gives law students an unusual opportunity to argue cases in front of the vaccine court—just like full attorneys.

After admiring their new certificates, it’s time to get down to business.

SOUND: [Typing]

Gentry and the students discuss briefs, expert opinions, and upcoming hearings. It’s a complicated job. The law students are here to gain experience but they plan to work in other fields after they graduate. For Gentry, though, this is her life’s work.

GENTRY: I was actually doing immigration law on 9/11. I had an office in the Watergate and we were evacuated out of the building and immigration law shut down, and I was actually laid off at the end of that week because of it.

Through a college friend, she got a temp job collecting medical records at a vaccine injury law firm. She wound up staying there for 19 years.

GENTRY: And then the law partner, retired in January 2020. And so I went out on my own at that point.

Vaccine injury law is a small field. And it can lead to some awkward conversations when she meets new people—it seems just about everybody has an opinion.

GENTRY: Usually it takes about five questions before I will say that I'm a vaccine lawyer, just because that does trigger a lot of interesting questions.

Gentry works with a federal program called the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program or VICP. It was created by Congress as part of the The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986.

GENTRY: Some kids were developing seizures after a Pertussis vaccine. And they filed lawsuits against the pharmaceutical companies.

So pharmaceutical companies drastically raised the price of vaccines and threatened to stop making them altogether. To resolve the issue, Congress set up the VICP.

GENTRY: If you're injured by a covered vaccine, which are all the vaccines on the childhood vaccination schedule, you must file a claim in this program first, before you can opt out and sue a pharmaceutical company for a vaccine injury.

When the VICP was first set up, it covered 6 childhood vaccines. Gentry says cases were typically resolved in about 12 months. But over the years, Congress added more vaccines, including the annual flu shot for adults.

That led to a lot more claims. But Congress never expanded VICP’s capacity, so cases started piling up. One of the cases Gentry and her students are working on this morning was first filed in 2009.

That’s the longest delay Gentry has ever seen. But even simple cases take 4 to 5 years. And all that time, families are stuck paying their medical bills as best they can.

GENTRY: And that's particularly impactful when you have families that can't afford treatment for their child or for you know, for seniors, that they can't afford the treatment, they're not getting treatment, for seniors in particular, and there have been instances where the person has died waiting for the pendency of the case.

Gentry often finds herself providing emotional support to her clients.

GENTRY: They do struggle. And oftentimes, our clients - we’re the first people that believe them. Because it's not just the doctors, it's their family. Because families hear the same thing, right? Vaccines are totally safe. Nobody gets injured by a vaccine—a lot of time—and then you're that one person. And, you know, we're often the one that believes them first.

Gentry strongly supports vaccines. She believes a robust safety net for those injured is a critical component of a universal immunization program. And—of course— her clients are all people who got vaccinated. That’s how they got injured.

GENTRY: And I've had clients that were nurses, lifelong nurses that routinely administered vaccines in their office. But they will tell you: be reasonable. Look, if you can have an allergic reaction to an aspirin. It's anything. Vaccines are very important, but they're not magical.

Most recent discussion of vaccine injuries has focused on the COVID-19 shots. But Gentry can’t take any of those cases. That’s because the COVID-19 vaccines are covered under a different program instead of the VICP. But that program is even more overwhelmed. It’s sitting on over 9000 applications.

SOUND: [Writing]

Gentry is trying to help by promoting bipartisan bill HR 51-42. It would bring COVID-19 vaccine injury cases into the VICP but more than that it will also expand VICP’s capacity. That would help ensure claims are processed faster. But it’s a hard road.

GENTRY: Talking about vaccines on the Hill is like walking on the edge of a razor blade that's on fire.

But Gentry believes it has a good chance of passing—eventually.

In the meantime, she and her students will keep doing the best they can in an overburdened and dysfunctional system.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Emma Freire in Washington, D.C.

REICHARD: You can read Emma’s feature about COVID-19 vaccine injuries in WORLD Magazine. It’s also available online today, and we’ve posted a link in today’s transcript.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Thursday, February 1st. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. Up next: WORLD commentator Cal Thomas on how some people in Canada are chipping away at historic protections for speech and religion.

CAL THOMAS, COMMENTATOR: In his novel 1984, George Orwell created “Newspeak,” a language that was imposed by Big Brother for the purpose of diminishing the range of thought.

That perfectly describes what recently happened in Canada to psychologist and author Jordan Peterson. Peterson appealed a decision by the College of Psychologists of Ontario that had ordered him to undergo a “remedial program” on “professionalism in public statements”. The College objected to comments he made on social media and during a podcast appearance in 2022. Those comments included his opposition to “climate change” hysteria and gender change surgery, among other “woke” subjects.

Peterson appealed the ruling by the College. An appeals court rejected his petition. He says his “sin” was “Tweeting opinions the college deemed ‘unbecoming of a psychologist.’” On the social media platform X, Peterson wrote: “It's capitulate to the petty bureaucrats and the addle-pated woke mob or lose my professional license.”

According to the U.S. State Department’s 2020 Report on International Religious Freedom, “The (Canadian) constitution guarantees freedom of conscience, religion, thought, belief, opinion, expression, and the right to equal protection and benefit of the law without discrimination based on religion.”

Critics are worried those protections are being eroded by the courts. The B.C. Catholic newspaper recently commented on a report by Aid to the Church in Need: “While Canada is nowhere close to countries where religion is under extreme attack from oppressive governments,” the author said, “the report contains substantial mention of growing religious persecution in recent years, from pandemic restrictions to hate crimes to the burning of churches.” Aid to the Church in Need claimed the following: “Canada continues to be a place where rule of law is respected, but generally there has been a palpable reduction in respect for religious freedom in recent years, particularly where it has come into conflict with entrenched views relating to equality, diversity, and public health.”

The case against Peterson would seem to add evidence to that perceived threat. Last year Canada adopted a law, ironically called “C-4,” which in another context refers to an explosive. Critics say that law against conversion therapy makes it illegal for Canadian citizens to quote Bible verses about marriage and sexuality.

Following the appeals court ruling, Peterson added to his previous posting on X: “You won this round. Mark my words, however: the war has barely started. There is nothing you can take from me that I'm unwilling to lose.”

In his book 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos, Peterson writes,“Speak your mind. Put your desires forward, as if you had a right to them — at least the same right as others. Walk tall and gaze forthrightly ahead. Dare to be dangerous. Encourage the serotonin to flow plentifully through the neural pathways desperate for its calming influence.”

It’s that kind of old thinking that has gotten him into trouble with the Newspeak crowd. Could something similar happen in academia and elsewhere in America? It already is happening.

I’m Cal Thomas.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Tomorrow: Culture Friday with Katie McCoy. And the new spy movie Argylle. Is it worth watching? That and more tomorrow.

I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

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 Jesus calling the crowd to him with his disciples, saying: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” —Mark 8:34-36

Go now in grace and peace.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.