LIFE SITE NEWS — After becoming our nation’s third president, Thomas Jefferson received a letter from the Danbury Baptist Association of Connecticut. The church elders expressed “great satisfaction” that Jefferson had been raised up to the “the chief magistracy in the United States.” They also shared their concern about a vagueness they sensed in the Constitution’s protection of religious freedom.... (more)

LIFESITENEWS — Pro-life congressman Mike Johnson of Louisiana has been elected speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. The final vote tally was 220-209. Johnson, 51, succeeds Kevin McCarthy in the role after Republicans were unable to rally behind several prominent candidates this week, including Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, and Majority Whip Tom Emmer, whose failure has been largely credited to Trump’s public opposition to him.... (more)

NEWSMAX — House Republicans chose Rep. Mike Johnson as their latest nominee for House speaker, hours after an earlier pick, Rep. Tom Emmer, abruptly withdrew in the face of opposition from Donald Trump and hardline GOP lawmakers. Johnson, of Louisiana, is a member of House GOP leadership and a lawyer specializing in constitutional issues who had rallied Republicans around Trump’s legal effort to overturn the 2020 election results.... (more)

JOHN GIZZI — Less than two hours after House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., abandoned his bid for House speaker late Tuesday, six other candidates will face their colleagues behind closed doors in a desperate attempt to find a winning contender to succeed dethroned Speaker Kevin McCarthy.... (more)

YOUTUBE — On the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show, actor Kevin Sorbo discusses his new book for BRAVE BOOKS titled "The Test of Lionhood," created to teach boys the importance of masculinity.... (more)

FOX NEWS — Donald Trump is running for president again in 2024. But there was a brief period earlier this month when the former president was also running for speaker. Only one person has ever served as both House speaker and president. But certainly not at the same time. James Polk was elected House speaker by his colleagues from 1835 to 1839 while he was a congressman from Tennessee. Later, from 1845 to 1849, Polk served as president.... (more)

FOX NEWS — Israeli forces released footage of the "Iron Sting" system launching a mortar bomb to take out a rocket launcher in its first-ever use in an operation on Sunday. The Iron Sting, described as "an innovative and accurate mortar bomb," is one of a variety of weapons being used to thwart dozens of terrorists, the Israeli Air Force posted on X, along with video it said showed the 120mm mortar decimating an enemy rocket launcher. The Israeli army used the weapons system in conjunction with the Israeli Air Force.... (more)

YOUTUBE — A mother takes her homeschooled children to the public library, only to find it’s changed a lot since she was a kid.... (more)

TOWNHALL — Justice Samuel Alito is warning that a recent decision made by the Supreme Court majority might give the government the green light to censor Americans. On Friday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a free speech case, Missouri v. Biden, that challenged the Biden Administration's communications with social media companies to censor the First Amendment.... (more)

C-SPAN — On the C-SPAN program Booknotes, Vietnam veteran Louis Puller, Jr. discussed his book, Fortunate Son: The Autobiography of Louis Puller, Jr., which details his experiences in Vietnam and his relationship with his father, a career soldier. Mr. Puller, an attorney with the Department of Defense, won a Pulitzer Prize in literature for the book.... (more)

YOUTUBE — Roman Balmakov, host of the Epoch Times "Facts Matter" show, lays out in masterful detail why Special Counsel Jack Smith's request for a complicating second location that restricted Donald Trump's attorneys in examining vital discovery documents was denied by Judge Aileen Cannon, who has shown unusual fairness to the former president not shown by other judges in the current partisan effort to hinder Trump's quest for re-election.... (more)

NEW YORK POST — Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) waved the white flag Friday in his battle to be named the next Speaker of the House of Representatives. Jordan failed to win the gavel in a third round of voting Friday, with 25 members — more than in either of the earlier ballots — voting against him. The House Judiciary Committee chairman and founding member of the Freedom Caucus struggled to win over moderates in his last bid for the speakership, winning just 194 votes from his colleagues on the House floor Friday before suspending his run hours later.... (more)

BOB UNRUH — Tyson Foods is world-renowned for its packages of chicken meat that are ubiquitous in grocery stores. And it produces other meat for retail sales, too. And soon, bugs.... (more)

NEW YORK POST — Israel is planning to establish a broad demilitarized zone surrounding the Gaza Strip after completing its impending ground-assault in the Palestinian territory and eradicating Hamas, according to reports. The expected DMZ would extend the length of the 40-mile fence already encircling the Gaza Strip, and would enhance the elaborate defensive measures already in place, according to CNN’s Nic Robertson, who spoke with Israeli ministers about the plan.... (more)

TOWNHALL — As Matt reported on Wednesday, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) hysterically repeated the falsehood that Israel was responsible for a blast that occurred at a hospital in Gaza on Tuesday, when it was, in reality, determined to be the result of a misfire by terrorists in the Gaza Strip. This happened the same day that protesters demanding a ceasefire stormed the Cannon House building. As of Thursday, Tlaib's posts on X repeating the same debunked narratives are still up, despite being hit with Community Notes multiple times.... (more)

YOUTUBE — EWTN's Raymond Arroyo sat down with singer-songwriter Dion DiMucci and discussed the legendary pop star's conversion to God-centered faith.... (more)

THE FEDERALIST — It all happened rather quickly on Tuesday — a matter of minutes, not hours. There was an explosion at a hospital in Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry immediately (and incredibly) claimed that some 500 people were killed and that the blast was caused by an Israeli missile, and every major media outlet took Hamas officials at their word and ran with that headline despite a lack of corroborating evidence.... (more)

STEPHEN MOORE — Perhaps what's most distressing about the latest collapse in high school test scores is that no one seems to be very distressed. You've probably heard the news that ACT scores have fallen for the sixth straight year. Our high school kids are less equipped for a job or college than at any time in three decades.... (more)

TOWNHALL — Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders will announce on Tuesday that a Chinese state-owned corporation must sell more than 100 acres of agricultural land in northeast Arkansas, the consequence of a law signed by Sanders earlier this year barring ownership of agricultural land by prohibited foreign parties, Townhall has learned.... (more)

JOSEPH FARAH — I've written much about "the world's collective amnesia" when it comes to the so-called "root causes of the Middle East crisis." The conventional wisdom today suggests the new state of Israel in 1948 was to blame for the creation of the Arab refugee problem. The mantra is repeated endlessly by U.S. State Department apparatchiks, Israel's enemies around the globe, and even by well-meaning, guilt-ridden Jews.... (more)

WORLDNETDAILY — In an interview with GB News, former BBC Chief Political Correspondent John Sergeant defended the BBC’s decision to not label Hamas a terrorist organization and smirked at calls to do so.... (more)

TOWNHALL — The Republican Party secured a massive win in Louisiana, putting an end to eight years of Democrat rule, as current Governor John Bel Edwards will be termed out in January. The Republican Party took back the governor’s office after state Attorney General Jeff Landry skated by the required 50 percent threshold in Louisiana’s open primary system. This eliminated the need for a run-off between the top dueling candidates.... (more)

NEWSMAX — Rep. Jim Jordan won the Republican nomination to lead the U.S. House of Representatives on Friday, but the hardline conservative appeared to be well short of the support he would need to seize the speaker's gavel. Successive closed-door votes left Jordan with the backing of a majority of House Republicans, but still shy of the 217 votes he would need to win the job.... (more)

WORLDNETDAILY — Israel announced that it killed Ali Qadi, a Hamas commander who spearheaded the mass terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7, according to a statement from the Israel Defense Force (IDF) on Saturday. Qadi led Hamas forces in a brutal terrorist attack against Israel that resulted in the deaths of over 1,300 Israelis and the kidnapping of hundreds more. The IDF and the Israel Security Agency (also known as Shin Bet) confirmed that it killed Qadi on Saturday, as well as Merad Abu Merad, head of the Hamas aerial system, according to The Jerusalem Post.... (more)

BUSINESS STANDARD — The $25 billion international network of foundations started by George Soros is shuttering offices around the world as it prepares to cut more than 40 per cent of its staff. Employees of the Open Society Foundations’ Africa operations received correspondence last week detailing the next steps of the process, which includes closing half a dozen offices in Africa, in addition to Baltimore and Barcelona, according to a copy of emails. “With the decision by the board in June to cut the staff by more than 40 per cent, our staffing size and footprint by necessity needs to diminish,” said Binaifer Nowrojee, OSF’s vice president of programs.... (more)