The World and Everything in It: September 22, 2025

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MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning!

Can a joke change the law? The Babylon Bee thought so—then proved it.

DILLON: One of the ways that humor treats the disease of bad ideas is by exposing them for what they are. I talk about satire as being like a scalpel, you know, it does cut.

NICK EICHER, HOST: That’s ahead on Legal Docket.

Also today the Monday Moneybeat, the Fed finally cuts interest rates. Economist David Bahnsen is standing by.

And the WORLD History Book: today, the seeds of holocaust .

KOMRAD: The United States was not just a template for Hitler, but in fact, was an inspiration for Hitler.

REICHARD: It’s Monday, September 22nd. 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 the news. Here’s Kent Covington.

SOUND: [Amazing Grace]

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Charlie Kirk memorial » Sounds from a memorial service on Sunday to the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

Tens of thousands packed out State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona home of the NFL’s Arizona Cardinals. Thousands more crowded into an overflow arena … bringing the total, by some estimates, to more than 100-thousand including President Trump.

DONALD TRUMP: I know I speak for everyone here today when I say that none of us will ever forget Charlie Kirk, and neither now will history.

Trump said he would posthumously award Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Many in attendance vowed to continue Charlie’s work, including his wife Erika Kirk:

ERIKA KIRK:  Through all the pain. Never before have I found as much comfort as I now do and the words of our Lord's Prayer, thy will be done.

She was unanimously elected CEO and Chair of the Arizona-based Turning Point USA. Charlie Kirk founded the political action group when he was just a teenager.

Erika also spoke about the 22-year-old suspect accused of fatally shooting her husband during a campus event in Utah earlier this month.

KIRK:  That man … that young man … I forgive him.

Others honoring Kirk from the stage included Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Donald Trump Jr.

Taliban reject Trump's Bagram bid » President Trump delivered a threat over the weekend to Afghanistan's ruling Taliban government.

It follows earlier remarks by Trump last week, when he said he wants to once again station U.S. troops at Bagram Air Base north of Kabul. He said it could be strategically important to counter threats from China.

But the Taliban said it’s not interested in striking a deal with Trump for U.S. forces to return to the base.

President Trump responded saying he will not keep asking nicely.

TRUMP:  We're talking now to Afghanistan and we want it back, and we want it back soon. Right away. If they don't do it, if they don't do it, you're gonna find out what I'm.

He followed that up on social media, saying "If Afghanistan doesn’t give Bagram Airbase back to those that built it, the United States of America, BAD THINGS ARE GOING TO HAPPEN!!!"

The Taliban seized full control of the base after the chaotic U.S. military withdrawal four years ago.

More countries recognize Palestinian state » The U.K., Australia, and Canada have formally recognized a Palestinian state, a coordinated move that drew an angry rebuke from Israel.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the move is meant to move closer to a so-called “two-state solution” to the regional turmoil.

STARMER: Ordinary people, Israeli and Palestinian deserve to live in peace … free from violence and suffering.

The announcements reflect growing frustration with Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza and the expansion of settlements in the West Bank.

But for now, the recognition may be mostly symbolic. None of the three governments has outlined firm steps toward embassies or full diplomatic ties. And leaders have stressed conditions attached to those kinds of future steps, such as excluding Hamas and advancing reforms.

But U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee criticized the move, saying Israel is not only fighting to eliminate Hamas:

HUCKABEE: What has been an existential threat to them since October the seventh. But they’re also dealing with a war with all of the PR nonsense that’s coming all over the world, but particularly out of Europe, and it’s very troubling.

More countries, including France, are expected to follow suit at the United Nations this week.

U.S. lawmakers visit China » A bipartisan group of lawmakers made a rare trip to China on Sunday, marking the first visit by a House delegation to Beijing since 2019.

The group met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang.

Democratic Congressman Adam Smith said the two sides clearly have their disagreements:

SMITH:  But open dialogue is absolutely crucial, uh, to resolving those and, and making sure, um, that we find a way to peacefully deal with those.

He said that dialogue is especially crucial on military matters.

Smith was joined by Democrats Ro Khanna and Chrissy Houlahan as well as Republican Michael Baumgartner. All serve on either the House Armed Services or Foreign Affairs Committee.

Li welcomed the delegates, calling it an “icebreaking trip” to strengthen ties.

Sonny Curtis obituary » Sonny Curtis has died at the age of 88. Curtis was a vintage rock 'n' roller who wrote the chart-topping hit, “I Fought the Law” and the theme to “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”

MUSIC [Moore Show theme]: … You’re gonna make it after all.

Starting as a teenager, he wrote or co-wrote hundreds of songs, from Keith Whitley's country smash “I'm No Stranger to the Rain” to the Everly Brothers' “Walk Right Back.”

He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012 as a member of the Crickets.

I'm Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: comedy and free speech on Legal Docket. Plus, David Bahnsen talks about conflict with in the Fed.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s The World and Everything in It for this 22nd day of September, 2025. Thank you for joining us today. Good morning! I’m Mary Reichard.

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

Today, satire, deepfakes, and the First Amendment.

A year ago, the Christian news- satire site, The Babylon Bee dropped a video parody dripping with irony:

NEWSOM: Hi, I'm Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. This is a message for the people of America given in my authentically recorded non AI voice. Thanks to my leadership over the last several years, that almost 1 million people are now fleeing the state every year. We even ran out of U- Hauls On my watch, the cost of living and homelessness have skyrocketed. Schools are failing, drug dealers and human traffickers are pouring across the This isn't a deep fake, and you can rest assured that it isn't, because I just signed an unconstitutional law outlawing deep fakes. No one would dare violate it. Thank you and science bless America!

That parody wasn’t random. As you heard the Fake Governor Newsom say, he’d just signed a law targeting “deceptive” AI political content. That part was the true part. The Bee made the video to force a legal test of that law—and it landed both comedically and constitutionally. Last month, a federal judge considered a lawsuit the Bee filed and struck the law down.

REICHARD: Last week, I spoke to the CEO of the Babylon Bee, Seth Dillon:

DILLON: We were ready to go, we knew it was coming. He had announced that he was going to do this. And we were working on a concept for how the moment he made this unlawful, we would immediately challenge it by violating that law, we were going to parody him immediately. It got a lot of attention. It generated a ton of attention.

One major issue was compelled speech. The Bee would have to post a disclaimer and set it in the largest font on the page.

THE BABYLON BEE: Definitely defeats the purpose because It kills the joke. It’s also compelled speech because it’s a disclaimer we don’t want to say….When you lead off your joke with ‘what I’m about to tell you is a joke,’ and then you give the joke, and then “what you have just read is a joke,” (laughs) it just totally kills it.

Because the law targeted content and viewpoint, the court applied the most rigorous level of constitutional review: strict scrutiny. The court found California law did satisfy a compelling government interest to protect elections, but it did not meet the second prong of that strict scrutiny test: that it was narrowly tailored to achieve that compelling purpose.

EICHER: Phil Sechler of Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented the Bee, explains why:

SECHLER: The court pointed at the fact that the statute was very broad and didn't even require an actual injury like fraud or defamation to be able to bring a claim against the content creator. Second, the court pointed to the fact that anybody in California who saw the content could seek remedies. It wasn't limited to the person who was injured. And third, of course, the court pointed to the fact that even satire and parody could be swept up.

REICHARD: The judge said that chilled political discourse, and ruled the state cannot play “minister of truth.” I reached out to Governor Newsom’s office and to the state attorney general by email and phone. My first message was actually blocked. The AG’s office wrote back that it was reviewing the ruling, and referred me to advisories about healthcare and consumer law.

EICHER: The case comes as comedians are under scrutiny. Just last week, late-night host Jimmy Kimmel was suspended after wrongly linking Charlie Kirk’s accused killer to the MAGA movement.

Some say it shows a double standard. Seth Dillon sees it differently:

DILLON: I'm not one of those people who's like, well, if my side's doing it, I'm okay with it, if their side’s doing it, I’m not. …these are principles that we have to uphold in any circumstances….When we're talking about our rights, what we're defending in this case is… the First Amendment, right and government using its power to suppress certain speech that is protected. That's a violation of the First Amendment. So if there's government enforcement or coercion or threats involved, you've got to look at that seriously….because that can be a violation of the First Amendment… If it's public pressure, that's different, you know, if there's a public response and backlash to something that somebody said, and the network decides that they want to part ways with that person, that person's voice hasn't been stamped out by the government. It's not like it's criminal for them to say what they say. They faced backlash and consequences for what they said, but it wasn't government censorship violating their First Amendment rights.

REICHARD: Much as the Bee stings, Dillon told me, even in tense cultural times satire can heal.

DILLON: One of the ways that humor treats the disease of bad ideas is by exposing them for what they are. I talk about satire is being like a scalpel. It does cut and people often feel the sting of satire. But you gotta think of it as a scalpel not a knife that you’re just running around stabbing people with. We’re talking about a scalpel that’s being used to cut out some kind of social cancer. You know, and that’s a good thing, a healing thing. It’s cutting for a healing purpose.

EICHER: Defending it costs time and energy, but Dillon says it’s worth it:

DILLON: You know, it’s advantageous for us to be involved in those fights because they look like the fools who are trying to silence comedians.

And he’s found some surprise allies along the way:

DILLON: I remember very distinctly when we were going through it with Twitter and Twitter had suspended our account. Bill Maher did a segment on it talking to his audience and guests about how, it may not be satire that I think is funny, and you know it’s Christian satire? I thought Christianity itself was satire, you know, he’s taking jabs at us. But at the same time defending our right to speak. So yeah, every now and then you find strange bedfellows where you weren’t necessarily expecting support but you got it.

REICHARD: Even when speech is offensive, lawyer Phil Sechler says the remedy is more speech, not government bans.

SECHLER: The other thing to keep in mind is what the judge said in California. He said the antidote is not stifling content creation, but encouraging counter-speech, rigorous fact checking, and the uninhibited flow of democratic discourse.

EICHER: Seth Dillon sees that same antidote at work outside the courtroom. He says humor — even sharp satire — can serve the cause of open debate. That’s one reason among many Dillon says the loss of his friend Charlie Kirk is so profound. Kirk embodied that spirit — a fan of the Bee who mixed argument with wit and humor to make his points.

DILLON: Charlie was an encourager to me. I don’t know that any of us have a lot of people in our lives who just proactively reach out to people to be an encouragement. But he was that person. He would just randomly text to say something nice—He would see something that you did that he appreciated and he would let you know. He did it publicly too but just privately behind the scenes, just privately saying, you know, keep it up, oh, I know that’s really hard, ‘I’m with you, I’m here for you, I’m praying for you’—and then sending a scripture verse along with that…to encourage his friends and allies so that they didn’t feel like that they were alone.

REICHARD: For Dillon, that kind of support is what the Bee hopes to offer in its own way — to encourage, to challenge, and to keep people laughing.

DILLON: Charlie’s death is a reminder of the darkness out there. I think Charlie would want us to move forward with a focus on what really matters. He’d want us to encourage each other, and he’d want us to continue to laugh. And so that’s what the Bee is going to try to do, to continue to bring levity.

And that’s this week’s Legal Docket!

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: The Monday Moneybeat.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s time now to talk business, markets and the economy with financial analyst and advisor David Bahnsen. David heads up the wealth management firm the Bahnsen Group, and he is here now. Good morning to you.

DAVID BAHNSEN: Good morning, Nick, good to be with you.

EICHER: The Fed has just cut rates for the first time in nine months, a move it described as a “risk-management cut.” Officials say they want to get away from a restrictive stance toward something more neutral, and I think you should explain what that means in monetary policy. But I’d also ask, at what point does an easing monetary policy shift from one you’d consider prudent into going too far—becoming excessively accommodative?

BAHNSEN: Well, I think the first thing that has to be said is that it’s very unfortunate that we have to speculate about what that is. Having a central bank who is supposed to arbitrarily determine what the neutral rate is is, I think, problematic when I believe market forces are the best adjudicator, and some rules-based system for doing such. We don’t have a rules-based system, and we’ve asked a central bank to set the price of money. Then they have to decide: do they want to set the price of money restrictively, accommodatively, or neutrally, given different shifts in the economy?

They have been consciously setting it restrictively—meaning setting the cost of money so high that it would attempt to slow down economic activity—and they have stated now that they want to move towards a neutral posture, which I believe we ought to be in something more neutral.

And your question then is: when will you know that they’ve gone beyond neutral into something accommodating, easing, trying to stimulate, and indeed perhaps excessively stimulating activity? Well, the question is not so much when we’ll know that happens, as to when it happens whether or not they wanted it to happen. Because if you go into a recession, then they are purposely trying to be beyond neutral into accommodative, using monetary policy consciously, purposely to drive certain levels of economic activity.

And if we are not in a recession, or if there is not an economic reason to try to juice the economy, so to speak, then how do we know that they’ve gone too far? Well, the answer is: you don’t know until you see it. This has been the issue for decades, going back to multiple times throughout the reign of Alan Greenspan as Fed chair.

So financial markets are usually the easiest way to see it, and when you see a lot of speculation and silly leveraged activity—what I refer to as malinvestment—in other words, a low cost of money attracting a lot of capital and a lot of debt and a lot of leverage and a lot of financial decision-making that you would not otherwise be seeing.

We’re not there yet. We’re not at a point where the cost of money is driving malinvestment, but that would be the thing I would look to, Nick, to see when that begins to happen.

EICHER: There’s also the question of credibility of the Fed. The President continues to apply pressure on the Fed chairman, the Lisa Cook removal fight is in the courts, and Stephen Miran has just come in aggressively touting deeper cuts. How solid is the Fed’s credibility right now—is it hanging in there, or starting to erode?

BAHNSEN: Yes, hanging in there and eroding. I do believe that the termination of Lisa Cook was very pretextual, that we had an unqualified Fed governor, so I’m not defending Lisa Cook. I don’t think that the Biden administration should have appointed her, but then the reasons that the Trump administration gave to terminate her, I think, are a very poor rationale. She may very well, by the way, be guilty of it, but she hasn’t even had charges brought against her, let alone been convicted.

And so I just still believe in enough procedural due process that it’s hard to take seriously terminating someone for something that may not even result in charges, let alone a conviction, and the courts have so far ruled that way. Now the administration is asking for the Supreme Court to jump in.

So you have this whole issue with the White House attempting to move out a Fed governor who, by statute in the Federal Reserve Act, can only be terminated for cause. And then now Stephen Miran coming in and being approved by the Senate and sworn in, and then a few minutes later being part of the FOMC meeting this last week and voting for a half-point rate cut—the only one to do so. Which is fine, theoretically, but on the dot plot he indicated he sees one and a half percentage points coming out by the end of the year, where no one else is even close to that.

So you kind of, I think, effectively see somebody campaigning as a Fed governor to be the next Fed chair when Jay Powell’s term ends next year. These things are all a little bit silly.

Now, the reason I say “hanging in there” is you did have a close-to-consensus view here on this single quarter-point cut that took place this last week. And even though there’s a wide dispersion of expectations for where things will be in the next couple meetings, there’s still barely a majority of nine votes indicating two more rate cuts this year, even though there are six people saying no more, and then there’s Stephen Miran saying one and a half.

So you have this kind of division on the Fed that we just haven’t seen much at all in my adult lifetime, and that is eroding credibility. That’s problematic. But it’s hanging in there, so that’s why I kind of answer on both sides of it.

What’s really the thing in front of us now is where we’re headed to new leadership in the Fed in May of next year, and the process by which the President goes to get there. I do believe financial markets will not mind at all someone who’s going to be cutting rates if that’s deemed the right thing to do, and just because the President wants it to happen doesn’t make it the wrong thing. In fact, I think the President’s been right to want rate cuts.

The question for markets and credibility is whether or not the reason someone’s cutting rates is because the President wants it. That’s the issue of credibility—that we want the Fed making the decisions it makes, right or wrong, for the right reason. Not for right or wrong the wrong reason, which would be political pressure.

EICHER: Okay, last question: Jobs growth clearly has slowed down, even if we haven’t seen a lot of layoffs yet. At the same time, the housing market is stuck, with potential sellers frozen into holding on to attractive mortgage rates, because they don’t want to take out new, more expensive mortgages. So between a hiring slowdown and a housing freeze, which is the bigger drag on the economy?

BAHNSEN: Yeah, well, of course it isn’t mutually exclusive. It can be both at the same time. But jobs are always the bigger issue because jobs and the health of the labor market feed so many other elements of the economy—from income to savings to consumption to capital investment to industrial production.

The various categories that drive economic growth really do have at their root a lot of connectivity to the health of the labor market, both in causation and reflection. What I mean by that is that you get a lot of economic activity out of having gainfully employed people, but you also reflect a healthy economy in having gainfully employed people.

So the other component to your question I would point out is that housing is a subset of the labor side as well. If the sellers’ strike in housing—this frozen housing market I refer to—were to continue, it would most certainly bleed into the labor market. There already is a substantial decline in those that are doing real estate agent work, title work, mortgage work, processing, construction.

The construction is also being heavily impacted by tariffs, so you have a lot of adjacent labor sectors that are connected to housing. So there’s a connectivity in all this that I think is important.

EICHER: David Bahnsen, founder, managing partner and Chief Investment Officer at The Bahnsen Group. He writes regularly for WORLD Opinions, and at dividend-cafe.com. David, thanks, have a great week.

BAHNSEN: Thanks so much, good to be with you.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Monday, September 22nd. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Up next, the WORLD History Book.

In 1933 Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist party announce a troubling new law. One with its roots in the United States. WORLD’s Caleb Welde has the story.

WELDE: The Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases. Its name should have been warning enough. The details are much worse. The Nazi’s are seeking – in their words– "racial hygiene."

POELLE: This is a movement that really grew out of social Darwinist thinking.

Beth Griech-Polelle is chair of Holocaust studies at Pacific Lutheran University. Audio from the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education.

POELLE: And of course, at the root of social Darwinist thinking is the idea that there are certain groups of people who are of more value who are more superior to other people.

The law says anyone suffering from schizophrenia, manic-depression, Huntington's hereditary epilepsy, blindness or deafness, those with “severe physical deformities”, alcoholics, and anyone deemed “feeble-minded” can be forcibly sterilized starting on January 1st, 1934.

KOMRAD: What happened in Nazi Germany did not arise …from nowhere.

Mark Komrad teaches at Johns Hopkins, and he’s served two terms on the Ethics Committee of the American Psychiatric Association.

KOMRAD: The United States was not just a template for Hitler, but in fact, was an inspiration for Hitler.

The United States is the world-leader in eugenics research and legislation. When the Nazis pass their law twenty four American states already have forced sterilization laws on the books. Hitler personally studied several of these.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of forced sterilization in 1927 saying it would be “better for all the world” if, “instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring or let them starve for their imbecility” they were sterilized. Here’s Komrad reading more of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes opinion:

KOMRAD: “We have seen that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it would not call upon those who already sap the strength of the state for lesser sacrifices.”

Holmes goes on to compare mandatory vaccination with mandatory sterilization saying since the government can mandate one it can mandate the other. More than ten-thousand Americans are forcibly sterilized by 1933.

Back in Germany the Nazis are busy creating a second national court system. “Heredity health courts” will be made up of a eugenist, a doctor, and a lawyer.

POELLE: Any person can recommend if they know that there is someone who should be investigated and be prohibited from reproducing, then they should submit those names for consideration to the hereditary health court system.

The Nazis promote eugenic ideas in magazines and on the radio. They specifically target women.

POELLE: If you denounce your neighbor, you are actually more womanly for denouncing them, because you're a caregiver, you're a nurturer, and as a nurturer, you're nurturing the health of German society.

The government is also asking all doctors, nurses, social workers, and school teachers to report anyone with disabilities who walks into their offices or classrooms. Midwives must report all so called "deformed" and “questionable” births.

January 1’st, 1934. When the courts open, they are inundated with reports.

POELLE: Between 1934 and 1936, over 259,000 victims were denounced to these hereditary health courts.

Ninety percent are forcibly sterilized. Hitler deputy Rudolph Hess says ''National Socialism is nothing but applied biology.'' People look for loopholes like purposefully getting pregnant.

POELLE: And then they would show up on their sterilization date at that clinic and say, Well, you can't sterilize me because I'm pregnant. And so the Nazis add in now that if a woman shows up to that sterilization appointment and is pregnant, the doctor should perform an abortion and then sterilize her, all at the same procedure.

Catholic and Confessing churches oppose the government mandates but to little effect.

KOMRAD: You know, physicians were cooperating with this. Physicians were falling in line with this. …and so that kind of legitimized it.

By 1938, Propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels is blunt. “Our starting point is not the individual, and we do not subscribe to the view that one should feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, or clothe the naked. Our objectives are entirely different: we must have a healthy people in order to prevail in the world.”

Sterilizations continue through the fall of 1939 when the Nazis issue a new decree. Doctors and midwives are told they must register all children and infants under three who they suspect may have a congenital disability. Midwives are paid two Reichsmarks– or about twenty dollars today– for each child they register.

POELLE: And as this information, as this data, is being collected, clinics, about 30 or so clinics all across Germany are being set aside for the so called care, in quotations, of these children.

Sterilization is not the only “hygiene” scheme. In 1933, the Nazi Ministry of Justice released a detailed memo saying they wanted to allow doctors “to end the sufferings of incurable patients.” They insisted euthanasia would only be available to those demanding relief that at least two doctors would have to sign off on it, and that only a doctor could administer lethal drugs.

The news makes it to the front page of The New York Times a day later. The headline reads: “Nazis plan to kill incurables to end pain; German religious groups oppose move.”

For WORLD, I’m Caleb Welde.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: A report from Israel, another Rosh Hashana celebration amid hostages still held by Hamas terrorists and no end in sight to the war in Gaza. And, we’ll meet a classics professor turned hip-hop artist turned folk songwriter. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Nick Eicher.

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 Psalmist writes: “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” —Ecclesiastes 4:9, 10

Go now in grace and peace.

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