The World and Everything in It: September 13, 2023

PREROLL: The World and Everything in It is made possible by listeners like us, Susan and Woody Rowland. We live in Lanesborough, Minnesota, but are currently on an epic 10,000 mile cross country trip from the northernmost tip of Maine to the southern tip of California. We hope you enjoy today's program.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning! House Speaker Kevin McCarthy announces an impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Right, we’ll talk about it on Washington Wednesday. Also today, news from around the world on WORLD Tour. And we’ll meet a woman who survived Ebola and then went back to Africa to help others.

Also WORLD commentator Ryan Bomberger on a law that places ideology ahead of children’s welfare.

REICHARD: It’s Wednesday, September 13th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Good morning!

REICHARD: Now here’s Kent Covington with today’s news.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Impeachment inquiry » House Speaker Kevin McCarthy says his decision to open an impeachment inquiry into President Biden is now the only way for Congress to fulfill its role as a check and balance to the White House.

MCCARTHY: The American people deserve to know that the public offices are not for sale and that the federal government is not being used to cover up the actions of a politically associated family.

Republicans have been investigating Biden family business dealings with foreign nationals from Joe Biden’s time as vice president. They allege that the president and his son Hunter wrongly profited from an influence-peddling scheme.

The White House called the inquiry “extreme politics at its worst." And Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer declared:

SCHUMER: I think the impeachment inquiry is absurd. The American people want us to do something that will make their lives better, not go out on these chases and witch hunts.

Many Republican members do not currently favor moving to impeach the president. But they say launching the inquiry gives House investigators access to information they have so far been unable to get.

Libya update » In eastern Libya, authorities and aid groups say the scale of the devastation from recent flooding is staggering.

Tamer Ramadan with the Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent:

RAMADAN: What we can confirm now is that thousands of people have lost their lives. Thousands of people have lost their homes. And thousands of families are stranded or lost.

As many as 10,000 people are missing.

Local and international rescue crews are still searching for survivors.

Morocco update » Meanwhile in Morocco, authorities now put the official death toll at nearly 3000 after last week’s powerful earthquake. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin reports.

KRISTEN FLAVIN: Rescue crews from Spain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates are still pulling survivors from the rubble of crumbled buildings.

Moroccan authorities have actually turned away search and rescue help from France, Germany, and the U-S. Officials say the teams could get in the way, if they rush in uninvited and without coordination.

Aid workers are also providing food, water, and tents for survivors.

For WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin.

SOUND: [Israel protest NATS]

Israel » Demonstrators took to the streets of Jerusalem Tuesday as the country’s Supreme Court heard the first challenge to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s overhaul of the court’s powers.

Justices will decide whether to toss out the law and provoke a constitutional crisis or cede power and possibly endanger minority rights.

Outside, some spoke out in favor of the plan …

CITIZEN: We want to balance the system. We want the government will have enough power to rule.

Others very much against it.

CITIZEN: Now, I feel that Israeli democracy is in peril.

The judicial overhaul would remove the high court’s power to strike down any law it deems unreasonable.

Netanyahu says the changes are needed to rein in judges that have grown too powerful. Critics accuse the prime minister of trying to weaken the Supreme Court in an unprecedented power grab.

SOUND: [Kim arrival]

Kim arrives in Russia » North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un stepped out of a green armored train car onto a red carpet in southern Russia on Tuesday ahead of meetings with Vladimir Putin.

The Russian leader’s expected to ask North Korea for ammunition for its war in Ukraine. But what’s in it for Pyongyang?

Temple University Professor James D. J. Brown:

BROWN: It would be more likely that food, energy will be provided. From the Russian side, I think they’ll hold back on providing high-tech military technology, at least publicly.

An arms deal would violate UN sanctions, which Russia supported in the past.

SOUND: [Helicopter shooting]

Joint drills Indonesia » In Indonesia American troops are nearing the end of two weeks’ worth of joint drills with Indonesian and Australian soldiers.

All three countries are stepping up their military preparedness casting a wary eye toward China which has grown more aggressive in the Indo-Pacific region.

Australian Major General Scott Witner:

WITNER: Doing that really builds our readiness, builds our capabilities and builds our partnerships and so we're very excited and happy with the way this exercise has gone.

But Beijing is not happy about the drills, accusing the United States of trying to build another NATO-type alliance near China’s doorstep.

Decongestants » The FDA may soon pull many top-selling decongestants off of store shelves. But not for the reason you might expect. WORLD’s Josh Schumacher

JOSH SCHUMACHER: Usually, when the FDA withdraws its approval of a drug or ingredient, it’s due to a safety concern.

But the agency may remove its backing of a key ingredient in decongestants for a different reason: it doesn’t work.

That’s according to an expert panel of advisors to the FDA.

Phenylephrine is found in over-the-counter pills like Mucinex, Dayquil and Sudafed P-E.

But Researchers at the University of Florida found that pills with phenylephrine consistently failed to outperform placebo dummy pills in test studies.

For WORLD, I’m Josh Schumacher.

I'm Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: Laying the groundwork for impeaching the sitting president…on Washington Wednesday. Plus, World Tour.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 13th of September, 2023.

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

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. It’s time for Washington Wednesday.

Today, another possible impeachment of another president.

The House of Representatives is back in session, and top of mind for many in Washington is the task of averting a looming government shutdown. But then yesterday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy added an item to the punch-list.

MCCARTHY: House Republicans have uncovered serious and credible allegations into President Biden's conduct. Taken together, these allegations paint a picture of a culture of corruption. That's why today I am directing our house committee to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.

What’s the story behind this impeachment inquiry?

Joining us to talk about what’s going on here is Daniel Suhr. He’s an attorney in Milwaukee who served as senior adviser to the Governor of his state, Scott Walker. He is also a contributor to WORLD Opinions.

REICHARD: Daniel, good morning!

DANIEL SUHR: Good morning, Mary, great to join you.

REICHARD: So describe what exactly an impeachment inquiry is …and what evidence or behavior will this inquiry consider?

SUHR: Sure. So we start with the Constitution. The Constitution is the governing framework for how impeachment works. And the Constitution sets a high bar for impeachment. When the American people vote to elect a president, we expect that person to stay in office for four years. And so the Constitution makes it an arduous process to remove a president, because we want to respect the will of the American people that's been voted on at the ballot box. And so that means the majority of the U.S. House of Representatives has to vote to impeach, it's kind of like a grand jury would do in a typical criminal case. And then the United States Senate sits as the jury and two thirds have to vote to convict. Two thirds of our senators have to hear the evidence, listen to the arguments from lawyers, and then vote to convict before we finally remove a president from office. And in all two plus centuries of American history we've ever net never actually done that before. We've never removed a president all the way through the end of the impeachment process.

This particular impeachment inquiry, that starting with Speaker McCarthy this week, is directing three committees of the House of Representatives to investigate whether or not President Biden's business dealings with his son Hunter Biden, and associates of their family, actually crossed the line into corruption, whether or not there were allegations of bribery and dollars changing hands to influence us policy during the time that then Vice President Biden was in the Obama White House.

EICHER: You mentioned high crimes and misdemeanors … and the committee probe … what is the House going to have to show in order to bring articles of impeachment that clear the high bar?

SUHR: So ultimately, impeachment is a political act, not a judicial act. In other words, when you have an average citizen in front of a jury, right, we expect evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to establish guilt. That's not the standard here. We have 435 members of Congress who are responsive to their constituents, to their donors, and to their own political futures. And Speaker McCarthy's challenge is can he reach a point where a majority of the members of the House, which would mean a vast overwhelming majority of Republicans are ready to vote for impeachment. Now, that might not be the right standard for high crimes and misdemeanors, right? That's not necessarily a legal definition. And so in terms of what proof is necessary, we're going to have members of Congress who are looking at the facts, looking at the evidence that this inquiry is able to assemble. We know it's going to include things like bank records of Hunter Biden's business deals, it's going to include these transactions between foreign companies and these shell companies that we've seen reported in the news that are ultimately routed to Hunter Biden, and then whether or not those business transactions correlate with the Vice President's official activities: was Hunter Biden essentially selling access to his dad and the White House in order to influence U.S. policy? And if he was, does the majority of the U.S. House Representatives find that sufficient within the political context that those members operate, to vote for impeachment? That's the question that we're going to work out over the course of the next year.

REICHARD: This doesn’t come in a vacuum. House Republicans, especially members of the Freedom Caucus, have been pushing for the impeachment of President Biden since earlier this year.

What kept that from happening before do you think, and why do you suppose McCarthy acted on it now?

SUHR: I think it's important to say some members of Congress have been pushing for an impeachment. At the same time, there are members of McCarthy's caucus who I think don't want this, right? And so McCarthy is sort of caught in this tension between one wing of his caucus that really wants to move forward with these charges and wants to go all in on the president, and then other members who are more interested in just the traditional tools of governing, and don't want these sorts of ugly political fights. And so McCarthy has been caught in the tension between the two, and several months ago, the standard he set was if you bring me credible evidence that shows serious allegations of corruption, then I'll launch an inquiry. And at least as far as he's told the media, he feels like he's seen that evidence and is ready to move forward now into this next more formal stage of investigation.

EICHER: Kevin McCarthy has another problem on his hands. Back in the 2019-2020 session, McCarthy, then the House Minority Leader, wrote a resolution that would’ve required the House to hold a vote before launching an impeachment inquiry. Now, that resolution was tabled, but as recently as a few weeks ago, McCarthy basically said the same thing. Vote first, impeachment inquiry second. But that’s not how it went down yesterday.

Daniel, why do you suppose McCarthy didn’t stick to that roadmap he previously laid out … and do you foresee it costing him anything politically?

SUHR: Certainly it will come at a media cost to him. But I think that he's obviously made a calculation, the media cost is less than the political cost of not moving forward with an inquiry. So, you know, back in 2019, when he introduced that it was in the context of what was happening to then President Trump and widespread frustration among Republicans, both in the grassroots and in the House, that Democrats were engaging in essentially cheap impeachments, that they were watering down what counts as high crimes and misdemeanors, because they were just so obsessed with, and angry with, the fact of Donald Trump's presidency. And so McCarthy as Minority Leader was responding to that frustration with cheap impeachments and trying to make Nancy Pelosi own impeachment.

He's in a different place now where he's Speaker, and he's got members of his caucus who are demanding this. He's got other members of his caucus, as I said, people who represent moderate or suburban districts who don't want to take a floor vote on this. And so opening an inquiry allows him to let the advocates for impeachment go forward. But it essentially puts the burden on them to say, Okay, guys, I'll let you go forward. I'll let you have the staff and the permission you need to undertake this investigation. But now the burden is on you to show me the goods, like come up with the evidence we need to be able to convince a majority of your colleagues to actually put this on the floor and take a vote that represents a broad, unified coalition within the Republican caucus. Now, obviously, for all of us as American citizens, what we should actually want are bipartisan impeachments. We're not at that point yet. But we also don't know what the evidence is yet.

REICHARD: Some say McCarthy is just trying to keep his party together while also trying to get back to Congressional business as usual. Do you think that this concession to the House Freedom Caucus will win him the support he needs to avoid a government shutdown?

SUHR: One of the problems with deals that are made in the back rooms of Washington DC, is it's really hard to hold people to them. And it's so it may be that for today, conservative hardliners in his caucus have said, If you give us this, we will give you what you need on the shutdown vote or whatever other issues are coming up. But it's really hard to hold people that deal in private, when they're then on the floor in public. So we will have to see. The reality though, is that all of these members are responsive to different political considerations. And the opportunity to get on Fox News, the opportunity to raise money nationally, the opportunity to be a hero nationally is when people don't play the game. When people stand up to leaders within their own party, that's how you get national recognition. And so at minimum, Mary, I'd say all of the incentives are for conservatives in the house to have their cake and eat it too, to take the impeachment inquiry and still throw sand in the gears on something like shutdown.

EICHER: Daniel Suhr is an attorney and a contributor to WORLD Opinions. Thank you Daniel!

SUHR: Thank you, Nick. Thank you, Mary. And let's all wait and see what happens and pray for our country and our Constitution. It's going to be an interesting few months ahead.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: WORLD Tour with our reporter in Nigeria, Onize Ohikere.

AUDIO: [Rescue work]

ONIZE OHIKERE, REPORTER: Morocco aftermath — Today’s roundup starts in Morocco where authorities and volunteers are still digging through rubble for survivors.

A 6.8-magnitude quake rattled the High Atlas Mountains—some 44 miles southwest of the Moroccan city of Marrakesh—on Friday. The tremors affected people in Marrakesh and other surrounding areas.

More than 2,800 people have died and more than 2,500 others are injured. Authorities continue to search for more survivors.

Morocco’s education ministry suspended lessons after the quake damaged nearly 600 schools. Many residents have slept outdoors for days, fearing aftershocks.

That’s what Asrir Abdessadeq decided to do.

ABDESSADEQ: All the people can only sleep here.

He says the earthquake destroyed all houses and that people are still sleeping outdoors in the cold.

Some communities have already started to bury the dead. Others are rushing to donate blood for the injured.

Morocco has deployed rescue crews and soldiers to the region to help. Aid groups say the government is only accepting limited help.

But they have accepted rescue teams and emergency aid from Spain, the U-K, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates.

AUDIO: [Rainfall]

Hong Kong flooding — We head over to Hong Kong where torrential rainfall has brought severe flooding.

Authorities shut down schools and businesses as the rains flooded some subway stations and turned streets into rivers.

Authorities reported at least two deaths and evacuated hundreds of people.

The rainfall is the heaviest Hong Kong has seen in more than a century.

Eli—a marine industry worker in Hong Kong—said the rainfall disrupted his travel plans.

ELI: The water was about a meter in the middle of the road so no chance.

Across the border, China’s southern city of Shenzhen also recorded its heaviest rainfall since 1952.

The rainfall came about a week after two typhoons drenched China and prompted a citywide shutdown in Hong Kong.

AUDIO: [Floodwaters]

In Libya’s northeastern city of Derna, deadly flooding had killed more than 2,300 people. Authorities expect the toll to rise as more than 10,000 people remain missing.

UN-migrant deaths — Next, to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

VOLKER TURK: Mr. President…

UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, highlighted migrant deaths in the English Channel, the Caribbean, at the U.S.-Mexican border, and also along the Saudi border, where a rights group reported mistreatment of Ethiopian refugees.

TURK: I'm shocked by the nonchalance that becomes apparent in the face of 2,300 people reported dead or missing in the Mediterranean this year, including the loss of more than 600 lives in a single shipwreck off Greece in June.

On Sunday, a France-based nonprofit rescued nearly 70 migrants from a double-decker wooden boat that had departed from Libya.

AUDIO: [Chanting women]

Chile anniversary — We close today in Chile, with more than 1,500 women holding burning candles outside the presidential palace and chanting “never again.”

The Sunday march marked the 50th anniversary of the military coup that gave rise to Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship, which lasted 17 years.

Pinchet’s security forces killed or forcibly disappeared more than 3,000 people.

Many of the women were family members of some of the victims.

Griselda Morena attended the march.

MORENA: [Speaking Spanish]

She says here that the ‘never again’ march is pushing for Chileans to never suffer through a coup, persecution, or torture again.

AUDIO: [Police/protesters clash]

Ahead of the march, protesters clashed with police outside the presidential palace in a procession that turned violent.

Authorities arrested at least 11 people. Chilean President Gabriel Boric, who was at the procession earlier in the day, condemned the violence.

Boric’s government launched a National Search Plan ahead of the anniversary to actively trace people who disappeared during the regime.

That’s it for this week’s World Tour. Reporting for WORLD, I’m Onize Ohikere in Abuja, Nigeria.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Hamsters are known for running on wheels for exercise, but these furry friends have nothing on Reeza Baluchi. This guy built what can only be called a human-size hamster wheel that floats. Audio from WPLG TV:

WPLG TV: He gets into a gigantic hamster ball and then tries to roll his way across the Atlantic. So far he hasn't even gotten close.

Not even close. Of course he hoped he could keep that wheel spinning all the way to London.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: What could go wrong?

EICHER: Well, for one thing the coast guard could show up, which it did, stopping Baluchi 70 miles off the coast of Georgia.

And this isn’t his first hamster rodeo, but each time he gets in trouble.

As he did on Tuesday, with Baluchi charged in court with two federal counts for his hamster wheel caper.

REICHARD: Ah, the wheels of justice.

EICHER: Yes, they grind slowly but exceedingly fine, which reminds me he’ll probably end up paying a fine.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Wednesday, September 13th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: surviving Ebola.

In 2014, the Ebola virus swept through Western Africa, and it killed thousands of people. Audio here from an October 2014 report by The New York Times:

NEW YORK TIMES: [Sirens, “suspected case in the city”, angry mobs, “stay away from the dead body”]

REICHARD: In Liberia, two Americans became infected while providing medical care to those stricken with Ebola. Their infections turned a global spotlight on the epidemic and the need for better medicines.

WORLD Correspondent Amy Lewis met one of the American survivors in Indonesia and brings us more of the story.

AMY LEWIS, REPORTER: It’s the summer of 2014.

WRITEBOL: We’re in the midst of the Ebola crisis.

Nancy Writebol is holding a small metal tank and a spraying wand. It looks like an herbicide sprayer, but she’s using it to sanitize the suits and gloves of doctors and nurses.

WRITEBOL: The mortality rate was 99 percent.

Writebol and her husband Dave are SIM—or “Serving in Mission”—missionaries.

To her knowledge, Writebol was never in direct contact with an Ebola patient. So she never expected that she would soon be a patient herself—or that God would use her rare survival to one day help other survivors heal from their trauma.

The date of July 26th, 2014 is emblazoned in Writebol’s mind because that’s when she went from helping dozens of victims to becoming one herself.

WRITEBOL: When we were diagnosed with Ebola there was no medication, just basic care.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC: Within 8-10 days, those infected by the Ebola virus may experience symptoms drastically ranging in severity. From fevers to diarrhea and vomiting, to internal and external bleeding, often from the eyes.

Her co-worker Dr. Kent Brantly was also diagnosed. Workers isolated Writebol and Brantly and told them that evacuation to the U.S. was impossible. Nobody wanted to get that close to an Ebola victim. They just had to wait it out and pray they would be some of the few who survived.

Then, a new opportunity. It was a desperate gamble.

WRITEBOL: The short story is that there was an experimental drug that had never been tried on humans. And there were seven courses of it in the world. One of the courses was in Sierra Leone. And the decision was made to bring it to Liberia.

Writebol still has the bottles from her dose of the drug. It says “not for human consumption” on the front. She and Brantly got evacuated to the United States where they started getting better.

While they recovered, Ebola continued to ravage its way across West Africa.

Jeremiah Kollie is a pastor and trauma healing counselor in Liberia. He says Liberia had already endured decades with a coup, riots, and a civil war—there was no time to recover in between.

KOLLIE: And then the war came to an end in 2014. And people started to regain control of their lives, putting it back together. Then came this enemy we all face—Ebola.

By the end of the outbreak, more than 11,000 people in West Africa died of Ebola.

It compounded the trauma they’d already experienced.

Back in the U.S., Nancy Writebol and Kent Brantly spent weeks in isolation. They talked on the phone. She wondered why she was spared when so many others didn’t make it.

WRITEBOL: And I remember saying to Kent, “Kent, I get it for you. God's gonna really use this in your life. You're this brilliant young doctor.” But I said, “I don't get it for me. And I don't know how God is going to use it. And, and yet, I trust him.”

Part of the answer came just a few months after her recovery. SIM asked Writebol to go back to Liberia, where the epidemic was waning. They wanted her to help people heal—not from Ebola this time, but from trauma. And she went. She worked with Jeremiah Kollie, using a curriculum that emphasizes more than just mental health.

KOLLIE: But we are doing it because we believe part of the problem is when people don't know God, they will not know how to forgive. When people don't know God, they will not know how to handle their situation. God's word, do speak to the hearts of people.

In 2019, Writebol was invited to do trauma healing clinics in the Democratic Republic of Congo at the height of their Ebola outbreak.

WRITEBOL: I first told the Lord, no, I wasn't going to do that. And I just didn't want to face Ebola again.

But God started changing her heart. When she told her husband Dave about the request, she thought for sure he would say she shouldn’t go.

WRITEBOL: But instead, it was like the Lord had already been working in his heart, how can you not go and minister to those who have experienced what you've gone through?

The Writebols have recently moved to Asia to start trauma healing counseling there. During one session, Writebol watched as one woman wrote her difficult experiences on a piece of paper and place it in a bucket of water at the base of a cross.

WRITEBOL: And as the paper dissolved, it was like her pain, the Lord had just taken the pain, and given her a new look, as to what he was going to do in her life. It was the exact day, July 26, of when I had been diagnosed with Ebola.

Writebol’s gratitude to God goes beyond being healed from Ebola nine years ago.

WRITEBOL: One of the purposes in God's bringing suffering into our lives is so that we will be able to comfort others who also suffer and for our own faith to grow. And so we say ‘To God be the glory for what he's done.’

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Amy Lewis in Jakarta, Indonesia.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Wednesday, September 13th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Here’s WORLD Commentator Ryan Bomberger on a new California law that puts LGBT ideology over the rights and well-being of children.

RYAN BOMBERGER, COMMENTATOR: The same political party that fights to mutilate children in the womb is also waging war to mutilate children outside of the womb. The latest evidence of this violence-obsessed dogma is the passage of a bill titled AB 957 in the increasingly totalitarian state of California. In a vote of 61-16 (with 3 abstentions), the Democratic Party passed an outrageous piece of legislation that threatens the very nature of parent-child relationships in the state. In a custody battle, the new law gives a judge the right to penalize a parent who does not affirm bogus genders and non-biological sex. That parent could be stripped of any rights to his or her own child – including custody or visitation.

Every vote against the unconstitutional legislation was from Republicans who make up only 18 members of the legislature. Every vote for it was from the Democrat supermajority that comprises 62 seats in the assembly.

The bill is unambiguous in its direct attack on the family. You either bow to LGBTQ ideology or the state can sever your familial bond. AB 957 states: “This bill, for purposes of this provision, would include a parent’s affirmation of the child’s gender identity or gender expression as part of the health, safety, and welfare of the child.”

So, if one parent is dead-set on amputating his daughter’s breasts due to the child’s public school-induced confusion, the other parent who opposes that life-altering harm could be considered unfit. In that case, the state would be encouraging child abuse.

How did “it doesn’t matter what two people choose to do in the privacy of their own home” turn into politicians’ public meddling into others’ homes? Where is the evidence that embracing homosexuality, bisexuality, and transgenderism provide better “health, safety and welfare” to any child?

Thanks to an onslaught of propaganda from news media, social media, Hollywood, the music industry and professional sports, children are inundated with false gender ideology and plenty of junk science. It’s no wonder that, according to Gallup, 19.7% of Generation Z and 11.2% of Millennials identify as “LGBT”. Compare that to 3.3% of my generation (Gen X), 2.7% of Baby Boomers and 1.7% of the Silent Generation.

I can’t be silent about this. I have worked with too many broken teens whose rejection of their design led to terrible self-harm and hopelessness. This is why it’s simultaneously heartbreaking and encouraging to hear the testimonies of detransitioners. When the State demands you can only affirm a pro-LGBTQ perspective, shouldn’t everyone question why?

According to BBC investigative journalist and author, Hannah Barnes, withholding transgender medical interventions for minors has never been shown to cause a higher rate of suicide. Barnes, by the way, embraces “transgender” ideology but says common therapies like puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones do not improve outcomes. Puberty blockers like Lupron have known and frequent side effects such as depression, anxiety, arthritis, and bone fractures.

Yet these and many other negative psycho-social health outcomes are rarely discussed or entertained by Democratic politicians. It seems they would rather affirm feelings than confirm facts.

I’m Ryan Bomberger.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: A judge in California tells a school district to keep parents in the dark when their children decide to use different names or pronouns at school. What’s going on in this new assault on parental rights?

And, a trip to see a pro-life museum exhibit. That and more tomorrow.

A reminder to please rate and review this program on Apple podcasts. It really makes a difference.

I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Yes, rate, review, and share, too!

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio. WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Bible says: Folly is a joy to him who lacks sense, but a man of understanding walks straight ahead. Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed. Proverbs chapter 15, verses 21 and 22.

Go now in grace and peace.

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